Zum Theorem der Identität: Tritität

The video work »Tritität« [Tritity] shows the faces of Peter Weibel, Nikolaus Lenau, a late Romantic Austrian poet, who spent the last years of his life in asylums, and Jesus Christ after a painting by Piero della Francesca. Next, quotations by the four people are heard for each portrait. Using blending effects that anticipate digital morphing, the photographed faces of Lenau and Christ are then underlaid with a live video recording of Weibel pulling faces. This brings the static images of Lenau and Christ to life and makes them speak. Just like the faces, the verbal messages of Lenau, Christus, della Francesca and Weibel are mixed and combined. The messages are relativized by the mixing of the quotations into absurdity. Weibel’s work questions the hypothesis of the existence of a single identity and throws the viewers back on themselves as message.