62°10'23.7"N 6°58'21.6"W
Við Áir, Streymoy, Faroe Islands
Machines scanning machines.
The act of registering [re: scan] an object is itself a voyeuristic performance — to observe, to survey, to watch. It is an act of visual undressing and derobing — revealing insides and making visible intimate details. Can the act of industrialised whaling, of dragging a carcas onshore, flaging the skin, rendering the blubber and crushing the bones not be considered a destructive and voyeuristic act? On site of the Við Áir whaling station are the rusting implements of such violence — machines that once imposed complete destructive authority over another living being are now exposed to the mercy of nature themselves, and the subject of the unforgiving gaze and study of paying visitors.
The museum itself beomes a production line - a machine for guiding movement and curating views. Visitors are subject to a strict narrative of action that traces the very path of the whale as it was processed on the site.
