Parallel Lines. Race (with Zoltán Lábas); Interaction for Two Cameras 1-8, with Explanation (Párhuzamos vonalak. Versenyfutás (Lábas Zoltánnal); Interakció 2 kamerára, magyarázattal)

Serial, semiotic representations of movement were the focus of Dóra Maurer’s process-oriented photography, which she took up for a decade around 1970. In Parallel Lines: Race, performed by Maurer and her student Zoltán Lábas (Hungarian, born 1955), the two participants faced off across a wraparound balcony in a Budapest apartment building. The “race” consisted of moving along the balcony while stopping to take a photograph of the other side at eight set positions; the “winner” (Maurer in this case) was the first to arrive at the other end. The resulting photographs, presented here as single images along with her plan for the event (see the adjacent piece), reveal tensions between organization and spontaneity, planned and chance time. The pictures offer both players’ perspectives simultaneously, yet suggest a lack of simultaneity or parallelism in their “lines,” as the competition of the race overcame the harmony of geometry.