Item Idem: Method of Loci

“Method of Loci” is an exhibition about everything that is happening right now.

For over a month, The Breeder Gallery has been transformed into a vault of information where French born – New York based artist Item Idem (Né Cyril Duval) has been building his referential universe. Exploring new dialectics with local components, he follows the principles of readymade contextualization and creates a multifunctional environment that maps the current human condition. 

The narrative structure is based on Method of Loci, a memory enhancement technique that was used in ancient Roman and Greek treatises. Also known as ‘memory palace’ or ‘mind palace technique’, this mnemonic device uses visualizations with the use of spatial memory to quickly and efficiently recall information. To the artist, it serves as the connecting constituent for the unusual and circumstantiated personal representations of the archaic and modern aspects of the time he lives in, while also abates the echoes between the works. To the viewer, it reads as the conceptual manual of the show.

Method of Loci is emphasized on a collection of sourced mass-marketed products and packagings. As a cataloguing venture, it stands as the post-apocalyptic turnover of Marcel Broodthaers collage walls, or Aby Warburg’s Mnemosyne Atlas.  By pointing out on what our eye can not see anymore, Duval picks and arranges the products of our rampant consumerism, turning it along the toxicity of the current world into an art medium by itself, based on the poetics of commerce.