Stolnar Stundir
(October 21, 2006), mixed media performance with Seabear, Safn Foundation and an undisclosed location in Reykjavik, Iceland

For Sequences, Trong G. Nguyen buried a work titled TIME CAPSULE OF APPROPRIATED OBJECTS (TO BE OPENED AT TIME'S END) at an undisclosed location in Iceland. Upon the artist’s demise, the work’s GPS coordinates are to be passed on to a lone inheritor, who promises to continue the tradition perpetually. It is literally the passing on of Time.

The burial was videotaped and broadcasted live at Safn Foundation, where the band Seabear (two rooms removed from the audience, but with their speakers funneling into the main gallery) played an improvised score to accompany Nguyen’s mission. As the tricky title indicates, every item inside this time capsule was stolen– both materially and experientially, as in a “stolen moment,” literally translated from stolnar stundir, the playful epigram referencing kitschy Icelandic romance novels.

The small wooden container itself was an (legally) appropriated box that originally housed a series of Vito Acconci etchings from 1985. Thwarting the notion of what a time capsule is suppose to be, the object does not reward patience or posterity, but rather, finds satisfaction in loss, lament, and dismissal. It is the resigned fate of Kronos devouring his children.

Generous support for this project provided by Digital Society and the city of Reykjavik. Heavenly thanks to Sindri, Örn Ingi, Guggy´, and Birta!