Nordlicht - 5.59 pm 2018

Curator: Immediately, I feel a kind of fractured beauty emanating from this piece. It almost hums with energy. Editor: We're looking at "Nordlicht - 5.59 pm" by Christiane Baumgartner, currently held at the Harvard Art Museums. Baumgartner, born in 1967, often uses woodcuts to explore themes of time and technology. Note the image: 119.4 × 89.5 cm. Curator: Woodcut! No wonder it has that tactile, almost brutal feel. The horizontal lines fighting against the burst of light...it's like a visual scream. Editor: It’s fascinating how she translates digital imagery into this very analogue, laborious process. The act of carving those lines…it’s a powerful statement about slowing down, about the human hand resisting the digital flood. Curator: Right, it’s like she’s wrestling with the light, trying to hold onto a fleeting moment. Editor: Indeed. Thinking about the time—5.59 pm—in the title, that liminal space between day and night, further emphasizes the process of transformation from raw material to final product. Curator: It is as if she is imprinting her whole body and the machinery she uses into this ephemeral moment of light. Editor: Exactly. It speaks volumes about our relationship with light, with technology, and with time itself. Curator: A piece that truly stays with you.