Untitled, 1995-2000, installation

The aspects which characterise the works of Tomo Savia-Gecan are emptiness, whiteness, and absence. The artist often introduces into the physical exhibition space and into the orientation of the viewer's gaze a certain incompatible element, a minimal shift, which is almost invisible, but which alters the normal, established spatial and perceptual relations. It often seems that one can understand his works as meaningful wholes only on a secondary level, i.e. through description, while an actual observer easily misses the work or experiences it as an uncanny, uncertain, sometimes frustrating situation. This is also the case with the project for Manifesta 3. Savia-Gecan presents a completely empty and white space. Although emptiness and whiteness easily evoke a number of interpretations and explanations, from the existential to the art-historical, observer eventually returns to the original experience of emptiness and absence. The observer, however, cannot perceive that the space is, in fact, constantly changing, that its dimensions very slowly, and thus invisibly, expand or diminish. These changes can only be perceived over a longer period of time, or if one enters the space several times.