Antonia Hirsch: Pulse

Pulse, a new installation work, combines several elements: a pseudo-scientific tool that suggests a medical diagnostic instrument or a navigational device, echocardiographic imagery, and sound. The apparatus invites the viewer to peer into its eyepiece revealing a radar screen. As the radar beam sweeps across the scope, it becomes apparent that the radar does not reveal geographical territory, but rather rhythmically animated images of the human heart.

The audio component is a live short wave radio broadcast of Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) and is clearly audible only in close proximity to the viewing device. Every minute, a voice announcement tells the time of day in Greenwich, England, and there is a 'tick' for each second. This broadcast can be received in nearly all parts of the globe. UTC is one of the coordinates referenced by the Global Positioning System (GPS) and follows the standard cartographic model, which designates Europe to be at the centre of the world. In Pulse, the contractions of the heart frequently appear completely synchronized with the time signal, until both beats drift apart again.

Antonia Hirsch's recent work investigates the many paradoxes of time and the mechanisms employed to track and maintain this consensual fiction. The history of international time zones, and the world view inherent in the politics of their implementation, have been explored previously in Recovery, in which Hirsch captured twenty-nine minutes in a Winnipeg rail yard to 'replace' those lost in that city's commitment to conforming to Central Standard Time.

Pulse furthers these interests by gauging the lapse and delay between the arbitrary construct of time, the momentary failures in the systems that measure it, and the bodily and geophysical terrain where time and technology play out their mechanisms of control.

Antonia Hirsch was born in Frankfurt am Main, Germany. Based in Vancouver since 1995, she has presented solo exhibitions across Canada, most recently at Gallery 44 in Toronto and Xeno Gallery in Vancouver. She has participated in numerous group exhibitions in Europe and in Canada; in 2001 her work Empire Line was included in the comprehensive These Days exhibition at Vancouver Art Gallery. Antonia Hirsch's work is currently on show at the Art Gallery of Mississauga and will be featured in a solo exhibition at the Kitchener Waterloo Art Gallery later this year. In 2004 her work will be seen at the Saidye Bronfman Centre for the Arts in Montréal.

The artist acknowledges the support of the Canada Council for the Arts.

Antonia Hirsch
Pulse