From the 1920s to the 1980s, strange adverts were spotted on billboards and the sides of British buses, which read: ‘Crime, banditry, distress and perplexity will increase until the bishops open Joanna Southcott’s box.’ From 1792, Joanna Southcott, increasingly aware of her divine mission as a prophetess with messianic connections, filled a "Box of Sealed Prophecies" that could only be opened under certain conditions.
When the First World War began in 1914, many believers in Southcott’s prophecies thought that this must be the predicted time of national danger. A number of different groups and people tried to persuade the bishops of the Church of England to open the box. During the 1920s and 1930s, the unopened box remained central to the beliefs and activities of the Millenarian Panacea Society – and for decades they continued to issue their adverts calling on the bishops to open the box.
In 2018 while we may not face a Millenarian catastrophe, although groups continue to exist which believe in that possibility, we do nevertheless, as Greek artist Danae Stratou believes, live in a time of multiple crises in which it is ever so easy to fall into a state of fear-induced paralysis. ‘It’s time to open the Black Boxes!’ is a participatory art project which is a reaction to just such a prospect.
For a two month period prior to the Pollença exhibition, through a blog, social media and conventional local media, an open call was made inviting the local community to participate in the project by submitting the one word that best expresses either what frightens or threatens them the most, or what they believe is in urgent need of protection. In this way the project reveals local concerns, hopes and fears to give voice to and to assist materially as many people as possible to attain a deeper understanding of our collective predicament. The words submitted include: Affection; Balance; Calm; Dagger; Education; Failure; Generosity; Hate; Ignorance; Justice; Laughter; Magic; Nationalism; Ocean; Plastics; Recognition; Sensibility; Time; Uncertainty; Values; War; Xenophobia; and Yellow.
At Eglésia del Convent de Sant Domingo in Pollença, Mallorca, 100 black aluminium boxes are geometrically positioned on the floor equidistant from another, so as to form a rectangular grid. The boxes’ lids are open at an angle. Inside each box a black screen is positioned at a 450 degree angle in relation to the floor. The boxes are surfaced with translucent mirrors, thus creating the illusion that they are filled to the rim with a liquid substance and that the screens within them are submerged in polluted water akin to an oil slick.
Upon entering the exhibition space the viewer is confronted by a mixture of sounds such as beeps, heart beats, explosions and flat-lines. The screens inside the boxes display words and numbers. The words displayed are the 100 considered most representative of those submitted through the open call. Each word appears for a few seconds before being replaced by either a countdown or a count-up (depending on the word). As the numbers race (down toward zero or up to a specially chosen limit), their pace, style and accompanying sounds resemble a ticking bomb. When the countdown, or count-up, reaches its climax, each box emits the sound of either an explosion or a flat-line. These sounds are designed so as to intensify the sensation of tension, crisis, and alarm.
By the opening of these ‘Black Boxes’ there is a symbolic bringing to light of the words from the open call that reflect what threatens us the most, or that which we are desperately eager to preserve. Black boxes are used after disasters to ascertain the causes, but these black boxes equate more closely to Joanna Southcott’s box with its warning of approaching disaster. These Black Boxes seek to open a public dialogue that examines how art in conjunction with new technologies can promote direct, sophisticated and advanced democratic models and practices. A catalogue essay by Stratou’s husband, the economist Yanis Varoufakis, aims to expose ‘the powers-that-be with the power to control our lives (the state, corporations, the media, banks, organised pressure groups etc.)’ and advocates getting inside the network and disrupting the information flow.
The hope is that, in a world in which we see the rise of misanthropy, xenophobia and toxic nationalism, projects such as this can lay the foundations for a new trans-European, reflective, participatory and tolerant community. The challenge is that the technology used by this project can as readily, if not more so, be used by business people intent on using populism to undermine the current checks and balances of economics and politics in order to create unregulated markets for the unscrupulous to exploit.
Curator Inés Muñozcano explores the synergies and dissonances of staging this installation in a hall used to exhibit contemporary art that was originally built in the 17th century as a church of the Dominican Order. As with the project and its wider context, the immediate context for this installation is ambiguous and complex; while noting the democratic principles of St Dominic’s Rule of Life, Muñozcano also notes its involvement in the Spanish Inquisition and, therefore concludes that this former church ‘reflects these internal contradictions, and the frustrated attempts to create a ‘bottom-up’ system eager to assume the principles of dialogue and responsibility.’
Joanna Southcott’s box has not been opened, the black boxes of airplanes are only opened following catastrophe and if found, the one box or container that was opened was that of Pandora, from which all the evils of the world are said to derive. The opening of boxes is not without consequence. This installation, while intending to encourage a degree of democratic participation to address populism, may instead be an indicator that by entertaining populism we have already reopened Pandora’s box.
‘It’s time to open the Black Boxes!’, Museu de Pollença, until 30 September 2018.
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