Fragile chair #2, 2022

In Fragile chair #2, Vytautas Kumža (1992, Lithuania) turns a familiar object, the chair, into a sculpture that can no longer fulfill its function. The work is built from fragile glass plates, hung with photographs and found objects. What once offered comfort has become fragile and unusable. The chair has turned into a diary, in which objects act as intimate points of connection, telling of lives we do not know. Rather than offering something to hold onto, the work invites viewers to look closely and form their own story.     

Kumža works at the border of photography and sculpture. Everyday found objects from flea markets and secondhand shops are lifted out of their ordinary existence and brought into conversation. Glass plays a double role here: it is transparent and invites you to look, yet at the same time keeps you at a distance. In his installations, Kumža reveals the artifice of the staging, reminding us that we are looking at an image, not at the thing itself.