
08.07.19
Excerpt: Exhibition
A New Show Takes Inspiration From the Same Idea That Drove Duchamp and the Dadaists
For Hilda Hellström’s latest exhibition at Étage Projects, opening this Friday, the Swedish-born, Copenhagen-based artist looked to a rather unusual source for inspiration: a semi-obscure literary idea known as "pataphysics," popularized by the 19th-century French poet and playwright Alfred Jarry (and once memorably referred to as "your favorite cult artist’s favorite pseudoscience" by Pitchfork). Pataphysics is a philosophy that gives credence to that which exists even beyond the metaphysical realm — in other words, the imaginary, the irrational, and the unreal.