Tina Haber - Panorama

About

In her exhibition Panorama, Tina Haber presents a series of abstract paper collages and film loops that relate to the horizon line in both content and composition. The images gain depth through the suggestion of light and shadow, abstract forms and nested layers become visible. The works do not follow a fixed spatial perspective—rather, they unfold into an unstable, almost surreal pictorial space that departs from the traditional notion of the panorama.

At the beginning of the 19th century, the first monumental panoramic paintings were exhibited in specially constructed rotundas, to offer visitors a seamless 360-degree view of distant cities, landscapes, and battlefields. Contemporary press reviews reported an overwhelming experience of the indistinguishability between reality and illusion, which in some caused "deep irritation" – even "dizziness and nausea"*. These physical symptoms were thought to be caused by the complete visual separation from the real environment. Apparently, the fully enclosed, architecturally stabilized illusion disrupted the body‘s sense of orientation. 

In contrast, Tina Haber’s panorama series seems as though they might fall apart at any moment or peel away from the wall, revealing something else. Some of the drawings are mounted on slightly curved display panels positioned within the gallery space like fragments of a stage set. The permanent gallery walls recede behind an additional, incomplete architectural structure that, like the modular paper collages themselves, could be extended in any direction. In addition, Haber's animations show glyph-like minimalist sequences that link the gaze along the horizon with the eye movements when reading text. 

* Koschorke, Albrecht (1996): Das Panorama. Die Anfänge der modernen Sensomotorik um 1800. In: Harro Segeberg (Hrsg.), 
Die Mobilisierung des Blicks. München: Fink Verlag, 1996.