Horizontal Alphabet (black), Mucem, Marseille: 25 August 2017-25 August 2019

Katinka Bock (b. 1976) is an artist of the “human scale”. Her semi-permanent display at the Mucem, Horizontal Alphabet, is a scatter of bricks based on human systems of measurement.

Taking place on the gallery floor rather than its walls, the exhibition speaks to a great diversity of measurement systems between cultures and centuries. The emphasis is on systems derived from the human body: hands, feet, thumbs and femurs. At one time, these body parts were all units of measurement.

Bock aims to capture both the uniformity and range of human civilizations. On the one hand, measurement is an essential practice for building or calculating in any society; but each society has devised its own system. With metres and kilograms taking over everything, Horizontal Alphabet gives a glimpse into the disappearing diversity of world civilizations.

Just because the art’s on the floor doesn’t mean you can walk on it. Watch your step!

MuCEM (Musée des Civilisations de l'Europe et de la Méditerranée)

7 Prom. Robert Laffont, 13002 Marseille