●●●○

A first impression of Exquisite Tempo Sector can be bewildering. A calm refuge from Temple Bar’s bustling Irish pubs, stepping inside this exhibition transports you to a kind of visual meditation. Large melting candles spread their waxy finger tips over the floor and yellow spotlights overhead create shadows on the walls which appear just as much a part of the exhibition as the objects that create them. One does not come to the exhibition to look, form an opinion, and leave but rather to take in an experience.

To form this experience, Barbara Knezevic has combined man-made items such as polyurethane foam with natural materials like Irish sea water and cedarwood oil. The exhibition claims this is to “make visible the hierarchies of value in material culture”. The artist places the common house plant Monstera Deliciosa in an elevated perspex pot, allowing us to examine all parts of the plant from soil to leaf like it were a product on sale. Knezevic is taking a natural object and treating it as if it were man-made. This conversion of the natural into the materialistic is simultaneously reversed by the melting of candles which form roots of wax that spread over the floor like the plant above. For a second, it feels like these objects should swap places and be placed in their ‘correct’ spots. As one spends time in this space, we realise that this alternate treatment of material creates an atmosphere that challenges preconception whilst encouraging the growth of new ideas.

There is a sensuality to this exhibition. The candles, the lighting and the simplicity of the gallery space, which has large windows that allow plenty of natural light all come together to create an atmosphere of calm.

Time is a prominent theme in this piece. A particularly interesting concept is the illusion of time in the absence of objects; photographic prints and an LED television represent objects that are not really there. The candle wax and plants which grow and die denote the passage of time and the presence of clay pots containing different oils give a sense of the past, a simpler way of living. Time seems to slow down in this space and we can allow ourselves to acknowledge its passing.

There is  a complexity to this exhibition. Whilst on one hand Knezevic’s new work creates a sensory experience where one can go to enjoy the simple beauty of objects – the musk of candles and oil and contrast between natural and plastic –  it also requires deep reflection in order to see it as more than a pleasing environment. It does not demand or challenge but asks and encourages. It is soft and gentle; neither an assault on the mind nor the senses. What I enjoyed most about this exhibition was that the essence of its meaning did not reveal itself all at once but unfurled over time, much like the leaves of the house plant.
Exquisite Tempo Sector runs until the 28th of January at Temple Bar Gallery and Studios.