Wolfli kantata

Description

Anyone familiar with the abundant vocal output of Georges Aperghis and the even more abundant output of writings and drawings by Adolf Wölfli can only be struck by the many elements pointing to a non-parallel evolution between the two works, as out of step as they may be in time, in space, in the very condition of creation, and in their artistic aims. In both, one finds this curious fascination with enumeration, lists, numbers, geometric and symmetrical constructions and, above all, the elaboration of a vocabulary that drowns words or fragments of phrases in a fog of non-signifying terms. The two works share the construction of vast decorative and sensitive architectures, visual and mysteriously sonic, as well as a permanent and almost obsessive search for meaning in the sensible, in the ineffable, in the inexpressible. To this one can add the constant use of structures made up of dense, superimposed and fluctuating layers, highly contrasting yet always linked by an internal logic which, made visible by certain repetitive traits and figures, remains unarticulated and elusive.