The starting point for Approach by Eva Koch (Denmark) is Dante’s The Divine Comedy, written in the 14th century. Koch uses the third part, “Paradise”. In these verses Dante is led by Beatrice into the divine light of Paradise where he sees beauty and perfection that cannot be described in words and he realizes that any attempt at description would be lacking because human memory and human language are just fragments of the divine language. In Koch’s work one sees an assembly of people using sign language and hears a resounding voice reciting text. The signing and the voice quote Dante as he asks for the gift of remembering and the ability to give words to the experience he has undergone in Paradise. Koch holds the viewer in the space between the spoken and the heard, the heard and the seen. She allows us to compare the meaning within words and the meaning within form and presents an ongoing simultaneous translation of a text that speaks of the constraints of language. This work of translation from one language to the next allows for varied interpretations and makes language as elusive as the very experience Dante describes in the Divine Comedy.
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