What is new instantly becomes old, a permanent attrition.
At least that’s perspective of artist Maaren Baas, who took a blowtorch to Gerrit Rietveld’s iconic Red and Blue Chair and turned it into something completely new.
“I do not want to destroy, says Baas, “… burning is not something negative. Standstill is. If things remain as is, there is no progress. It’s about changing of what we already know. It’s very human to keep things as they are. While it is very natural to continuously adapt. In nature nothing ever stops changing. It is an ongoing process.”
If a museum is where pieces of art go to congregate in dust, then remixing a version of them at least gives them the potential of new form.
What is great should remain preserved. But it is the pattern of nature’s interest to evolve from past states on top of so-called originality, at least to keep the remix going.
Stagnancy is the work of the devil.