THE FUTURE HAS BEEN FOUND, +9, IERA ODOS, ATHENS, 2019

text by Dr Kostas Prapoglou, curator

The five-channel video installation the future has been found (2019) by Manolis Baboussis investigates the conceptual symbiosis of an excavation and the fragments of a found text that somehow signifies our current present and concurrently discloses the future. Blurring the boundaries of reality, the oracular verses of the unearthed text deeply interrogate topical issues and the pathologies of our time. These poetic extracts could perhaps be part of a personal diary, letter or testament of someone who once lived in the distant past but in an unexplained way was able to foresee the future through the eyes of the present reader. The inexorable digging of the unidentified male figure denotes the crave to discover the unknown. The instalment of the two screens on the chairs, springs to mind reader’s chairs or passenger seats delineating a metaphorical quest for the holy grail of knowledge, survival and immortality. Baboussis with his sardonic burst of amphibological linguistic raps scans our contemporary society and blatantly criticises it, directly reacting to its flaws and faults in an almost prophetic way. The inventiveness in the artist’s take on the future, bears immediate consequences regarding the way we deal with our own fears when we think of it without us being part of it. The idealistic declaration that the future is found, unexpectedly fills us with a liberating and redemptive feeling as we suddenly develop the deception of the elongation of time and, consequently, the lengthening of our mortal entity. The work of Baboussis puts a surreal twist on the parameters of life, humourously re-shuffling the elements of time and gently embracing an emotional upheaval that almost invades us without noticing.