I DID ALL MY BEST TO SMILE

I Did All My Best to Smile unfolds around a tension between promise and impossibility, between the language of safety and the persistence of human vulnerability.

At the center of the space stands an overturned baby grand piano. From its interior a piano-only version of David Bowie's Sound and Vision, played by Leo Anđelković, plays continuously. The inverted instrument suggests a loss of function, an object that can no longer fulfill its purpose.

On a black pedestal a large distorted Mickey Mouse mask is eventually placed. During the performance it covers the face of a boy in a wheelchair who sings David Bowie's Sound and Vision. The song repeatedly promises the arrival of “sound and vision,” yet the performer remains seated, unable to rise to receive them. What in the lyrics appears as anticipation becomes a paradox: the awaited gift arrives, but the body cannot move toward it. Next to him six hostesses, figures traditionally associated with guidance and safety, stand in two groups around a monumental megaphone constructed from black adhesive tape. Instead of providing instructions they endlessly repeat a meaningless refrain: turu ru ru ru ru. The megaphone, rather than amplifying communication, becomes a silent monument to the impossibility of delivering reassurance.

Two images observe the scene from the wall: a stylized skull and a large collage depicting the Plague Doctor. The latter is framed between two glass panes, pierced by an opening through which the paper beak protrudes, as if attempting to escape the flat surface of the image and enter the space of the installation. Completing the environment, the entire ceiling of the gallery is covered with glossy black adhesive film. By reversing the expected spatial hierarchy-turning the ceiling into the darkest element of the room-the architecture itself becomes unstable, leaving the viewer in a suspended perceptual state. At the end of the performance the Mickey Mouse mask is placed on the pedestal, absorbed into the installation as an exhibition object.