Metastation of Abandoned Tones

Lubo Kristek recast into an assemblage the impulses that Salvador Dalí had exuded on him. After one of their many encounters, still in Dalí’s olive garden in Port Lligat, he felt the urge to sketch the artwork later called Metastation of Abandoned Tones. Strings, cords, mechanics and the keyboard form an ingenious tool. Its functional part is a half of a face that has Dalí’s appearance (including his characteristic moustache), which passes into the ‘architectonics of soul’ pertaining to Kristek’s symbology. The tentacles or funnels work as connectors with another part of the assemblage. A coat and a hat stained with colours can be found in it as the relics with which Kristek was fleeing over the border to find freedom in 1968. Ten years later, this assemblage became the main motif of the poster for Kristek’s solo exhibition in Schaezlerpalais, Augsburg (24. 8. - 8. 10. 1978). Here, the artist developed the idea of the relativity of values. Above the face, we can see a golden firm ball passing into a liquid state at the bottom part. However, it is the relativity of values of earthly possessions where a more significant emphasis is placed. On its passage through the head, the golden ball becomes a matter strongly evoking excrement. On the incentives that led him to create this assemblage, Kristek stated: ‘Until man understands relativity, his gateway to the absolute remains closed.’ Today, the artwork exhibited at Ruegers Palace (in Riegersburg in Lower Austria).