40 a

acrylic on paper
74,5 × 105 cm

Description: The painting “40 a” consists of the lower-case printed letter “a” written 40 times in white on a black ground, five rows of eight letters. Written out the way we learned to write in our school exercise books. But I don’t aim at either identical or perfect writing. Each “a” written out has its own particularity: a place in which the paint is gathered more densely and that on which the stroke is almost lost without endangering the legibility.

Interpretation: Laughter is, it is known, a universal phenomenon, in all cultures.
In the spirt of this universality, here I interpret the vowel “a”, in which people express various psychological and physical conditions. The vocal articulation indicates the difference in conditions. We all know the anxious exhalation with which we relieve ourselves of accumulated frustration. The nervous “aaa” when we seek something in a hurry. The impish “a” with which we let a familiar person know that we have fathomed a ticklish secret. The merry “a” we use to put a small child in a good mood. The querying “a”. Angry. Also the “a” of someone frightened by sudden situation. Or the “a” in pain when for example we are stung by a wasp, bitten by an ant or give ourselves a bang against something.

It is not a problem to cite 40 “a” situations or 182, the number of “a”s cast in a bronze relief in Braille.
However, before my eyes glints Munch’s “The Scream”, anthology image of the Norwegian expressionist, with a scene of a person on a bridge screaming an inner shriek. If this were not the case, the other pedestrians would at least turn round.

In conclusion: it is therapeutic and important to share all the various “a” situations with others, not to cocoon one’s own I (“a”)m, so that it should not become either a mute or a piercing cry on the road of despair.

(2024; written for the audio guide to the exhibition “NON-BAR-RIER-S” [“NE-PRE-PRE-KE”] in the Typhlological Museum in Zagreb, 2024)