Victor 1993

In the 1990s, Whiten produced a series of three-dimensional works employing mirrors. In Draw, 1993, and Vault, 1993, mirrors serve to implicate the viewer by capturing their reflection in part or in full. By contrast, in Victor, the viewer’s reflection is thwarted. Here, a full-length mirror is placed within a door-sized wooden frame. Within the frame is an opaque frontal image of a man standing on a raked threshold. The grey, painted surface of the figure is the back of a mirror; essentially, two mirrors face each other. Approaching the work, our own image merges with this silhouette, while the edges of the figure, rimmed in gold, seem to reverberate in infinite reflection, producing an intense field of visual energy.

In earlier works by Whiten, including Ark, 1976, and Ch-air, 1992, and series such as Descendants of Parsifal, 1986, the human figure is represented in absentia. Presence is conveyed through bodily traces and temporal imprints: skulls, bones, hair, teeth, chewing gum. In his other mirrored works, the human figure is introduced through the viewer’s reflection. By contrast, the human figure in Victor is rendered as a life-size silhouette of the artist.

Given its scale, as we stand in front of this work, our encounter shifts from an intellectual approach to a physical experience. The door frame signifies an entrance, a portal—in this case to the unknown or unfamiliar, recalling Lewis Carroll’s 1871 novel Alice Through the Looking-Glass and the fantasy world that lies behind the mirrored surface where everything is reversed.

The title Victor suggests mastery, success, overcoming an antagonist. The notion of prevailing in battle is implied. Yet, who is the victor? The figure rendered here suggests the “shadow self” in Jungian terms, the negative or unconscious self, which blocks self-perception—the self in the absence of light. The “victor” is revealed as the guardian of the threshold, the obstacle at the door tempering our pace.

In Victor, the mirror points to the conditions of consciousness, self-knowledge, and self-reflection. Gazing at its surfaces, we neither perceive nor experience our own reflection. Instead, we are absorbed within the flat, limited range of this dimensionless shadow. Confronting this self-image is the first point of entry on this journey of self-discovery.  As Whiten recalls from the New Testament: “For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.”