Some say, there are three ways to recognize a spy. One of them: They know how to make a fire without smoke.
Tobias Zielony’s new video work How To Make a Fire Without Smoke takes a closer look at the border between Lithuania and Belarus — in total darkness, through the lens of his camera. The border, as an abstract invisible construct (impossible to recognize by human eyes within the landscape) does remain a physical obstacle, especially for those who try to cross them. They create atmospheres of fear far around them, implemented by the heavy militarization on the borders, oscillating spies in the exclusion zone, and the push back of refugees. In Belarus, everybody could be a spy. Like the cynical politics of pushing refugees across the border, hybrid warfare corrodes trust between families and friends as a calculated strategy.
Picking up on the aesthetic of seeing without actually being able to see, Tobias Zielony approaches the questions of recognizing literally and metaphorically. Following the question "What remains possible to grasp for the camera lens when there is no light at all?“, the artist explores ways of seeing and recognizing moving bodies in the border zone, filming them hiding in the forests during the night. Through the lens, they become flickering red pixel on soft and unsolid black grounds. Here, the uncanny of the dark functions simultaneously as protection and danger. — how can we recognize what we have to fear when it stays invisible?
