The exhibition …barely pausing/pausing barely… marks the first edition of an annual collaboration between A Tale of A Tub and Tlön Projects and presents a variety of artworks selected from the imaginary collection of Tlön Projects. This imaginary collection is formed by the convergence of selected artworks from various international private art collections, whereby Tlön Projects aims to generate access to artworks which otherwise would have been largely shielded from public access.

In …barely pausing/pausing barely… the volatile state of stasis, on a physical, personal and societal level—produced by opposing modes of hyperactivity and inertia—is taken as a starting point to discern the tireless and profound influence of capitalism in which we are all caught in. The assortment of artworks and experiences in this exhibition has been selected to occupy a liminal interstice, a space that calls the all-encompassing logic of capitalist power into question. The artworks serve to unravel the ways in which technological flows and processes have transformed our lived experience into economic abstractions.

The collection of works is shown against the historical backdrop of the former function of the exhibition space as a public bath and wash house—which served as a site for domestic labour, physical cleansing and recovery. A number of artworks trace the phantasmic presence of entangled bodies and environments that are incompatible with the conventional understanding of time and space, while other works alienate and fragment our understanding of subjectivity and personhood through unexpected utterances and movements. The exhibited inventory of acts, gestures and activities are simultaneously done and undone, and even in their unvarying repetitions may hold a potential break with the cyclical trap of work, life and rest in a time bound by management and self-discipline .

…barely pausing/pausing barely… is supported by the Municipality of Rotterdam and the Mondriaan Fund, and is developed in close collaboration with Tlön Projects.