‘Qoheleth’ is an installation consisting of a system of interconnected machines, in which water exists simultaneously as a solid (ice), liquid (water) and gas (steam). Computers control the movement of the water through the system via pumps and tubes, and switch the component machinery on and off as required to maintain the three physical states at all times.
Inspired by one of the oldest books in the Old Testament, this work consists not of didactic instruction but is essentially an open-ended monologue about the meaninglessness of life. The narrator, Qoheleth, is a king at the end of his life, trying to reconcile the fact that all achievements, victories, justice and wisdom amount to nothing since everything living must die.
‘Qoheleth’ is a response to the sorrow created by the illusion of being. It is an attempt to create a polymorphic system in which individual states of being are continually coming into existence only to disintegrate, creating a cycle of eternal becoming.