“Midday,” or the Glorious Moment When “The Two” Is Born

–

“Man is a rope stretched between the animal and the Superman—a rope over an abyss.

A dangerous crossing, a dangerous wayfaring, a dangerous looking-back, a dangerous trembling and halting.”1

–

As one of the most renowned Nietzsche scholars, Alenka Zupančič believes that Nietzsche’s understanding of the concept of ‘the two’ is his most significant philosophical innovation.

‘The two’ is the primary outcome of midday.  And midday is an image of sorts: a metaphor or a non-conceptual concept.  Midday is the most brilliant and generative interpretation of truth.  Midday is not a moment in which shadows fade: it is when the shadows become shortest. It is not the moment of things becoming one in the unifying embrace of the sun, but the moment of rupture, when united things are separated: the moment of ‘the one’ becoming ‘the two.’ .  Midday is the glorious moment in which ‘the two’ is born.  ‘The two’ means the minimum, uninterpretable differentiation that leaves a gap in all things. ‘The two’ is the fountainhead and the drive .

It is the beginning of the inner tension of things.  Many concepts are formed through the concept of midday, all of which can be evaluated with reference to the concept of ‘the two,’ e.g. ‘eternity,’ ‘gaze,’ ‘nuance,’ ‘almost,’ and ‘middle.’  The divergent logic of ‘the two’ inadvertently mingles with the concept of ‘middle.’  There is no motion before ‘the two,’ because there is no middle then; the only motion that exists is the movement between realization and potentiality.  And the repetition of the same movement.  Movement in the middle has nothing to do with ‘taking action,’ the ‘middle ground,’ or ‘conservativeness.’  It is, rather, the manifestation of logical disjunction and conjunctive analysis: both at the same time.  Regarding all the concepts that result from the concept of ‘the two’ (as mentioned above), perhaps we can consider the show’s point of departure as the fact that all the artists of this exhibition are more or less thirty years old; or, as it were, in the midday of their flourishing . They have gained the experience of childhood, adolescence, and studying at universities; now they are going to learn the experience of being professional. Some of them are more talented and creative, others more diligent and prolific; some with adventitious and others with inherent depth. We can make a long list of these categorical dichotomies or antinomies.  What is essential, however, is grasping the concept of ‘moving in the middle’ (as already mentioned) through the concept of ‘the two’ and grasping the concept of ‘the two’ through the metaphor of ‘midday.’ What matters is to understand the rupture and the abyss that come to be through the concept of ‘the two’: standing on the verge of the gap, and, even more significantly, the decisive moment of taking the fatal leap.  Revolution is born at midday.  It is at midday that nuances unite with the truth.  It is at midday that all the universes split in two.  In this sense, it does not matter where the artworks of this exhibition stand in relation to the audience’s understanding of art .  What matters is the self’s understanding of the divergent logic of the self. This is the self we call ‘the artist’ within this context, while in other areas they might be called husbands, fathers, mothers, bosses, landlords, mourners, etc. (regardless of ‘moral’ questions) .  As in Thus Spake Zarathustra and story of ‘rope-dancer,’2 the task of moving in the middle is possible through dexterity, concentration, vigor, legerity, and agility.  In other words, something between a madman and a corpse.

Amirhossein Bayani, August 2017

1. Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spake Zarathustra,

Translated by Thomas Common, p. 46

2. ibid, p. 30

Episode 02: Midday
Group exhibition curated by Amirhossein Bayani
Artists: Iman Ebrahimpour, Mehrdad Eskandari, Mehdi Dandi, Sheida Arab Yazdi, Amir Farsijani, Jamshid Mohammadi, Mahsa Merci