ORIENT EXPRESS 1987, new version, exhibition at OSTRALE / DRESDEN 27.8 to 19 sept. 2010.
Technoromanticism.com
In October 1987 Stéphan Barron rode the Orient Express from Paris to Budapest and every hour took a Polaroid of what he saw.
In Budapest the 25 Polaroids of that one-way trip were scanned and sent to Paris by modem.
The same process was used from Budapest to Paris and the 25 digitalised Polaroids of the return trip were sent from Paris to Budapest.
ORIENT EXPRESS in OSTRALE
The project was realized during a pivotal phase of european history, two years before the fall of the Berlin wall, there is an almost premonition sense of the rejoining of the post war divide.
This work is highly significant in its use of networks, digital technology and art on global scale. Ideas that seem omni-present now, ecology, travel and changes in our perception of time and space are all thoroughly explored in this mid 80`s work.
Orient express is important in the canon of technoromanticism, there are echos of the work of Caspar David Friedrich exploring common themes of distance, scale, spiritualism and fraternity by employing the tools of our time. By way of co-incidence Friedrich`s ¨The big enclosure¨ (Das große Gehege - Ostra Gehege) was painted in 1832 at the site that is now the Ostrale.
