E 21 This folding inward also enables De-Kalo to tie the upper and lower worlds, since she does not associate the underground world with an entirely different temporal dimension. The upper stories of the university building are also shaped by cyclical time – classes that repeat weekly, a recurring sequence of semesters, and recycled curriculums. Nor does De-Kalo dismiss the upper world or its importance. She simply calls our attention to the subterranean layer, underscoring the different perception and experience of time within it. In this sense, the “spiral time” reflects the institution’s multiple temporal dimensions, since not only is it a formal means, but is also analogous to the institutional structure itself. The institution is presented as a system operating in a continuously recurrent, multilayered cyclical rhythm, which is not visible to all yet enables it to function on numerous temporal registers. In the upper world, time is organized and framed within a clear institutional framework. It is given expression through distinct, carefully planned official events – classes, lectures, meetings, exhibition openings. In contrast, time in the underground spaces is an ongoing continuum of work that does not culminate in official events but is instead composed of everyday actions – loading, sorting, printing, binding, shipping – that recur almost indistinctly. The deconstruction of time and space is further underscored in Underground City B. In this section of the work, De-Kalo repeats each video segment three times, yet the spatial organization is partially altered. The segments are no longer presented alongside each other as a horizontal continuum, but instead are projected on two horizontal yet discontinuous screens and a third screen which is vertically positioned. This arrangement creates a display in which repetition operates not only in the temporal dimension, through the recurring appearance of the images, but also in the spatial dimension. Time seems to split and fragment due to the cyclical repetition of the segments, while the space itself is undermined as the viewers’ gaze must move between the screens in order to reconnect them. The arrangement gives rise to the experience of a cyclical-spiral structure, in which time and space become entangled, losing their clear linear organization. The splitting of space that De-Kalo creates through her arrangement of the screens may represent an attempt to compensate for the absence of a spatial dimension within the video works themselves. The three video channels present closeups of a mechanical sequence of actions that include cutting paper, copying single pages, and scanning notebooks. A human hand is subsequently seen scanning the barcodes on what appear to be a pile of exam books. The close-up perspective removes the spatial cues necessary for orientation, both in relation to the copying machine’s location within the underground area, and in relation to the identity of the human subject holding the barcode scanner. The continuum of actions
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