The black granite chair is not a memorial or a symbol of static. This is the point of choice where a person finds himself on the threshold of eternity facing a trivial but still pressing question: sit or stand up? Should I stop or go? To freeze in stone as a monument to fatigue — or to push away the support and step into an unknown, dangerous and alluring future? Modern culture is frozen in front of this choice. There is a longing for the eternal in her, but also a fear of petrification; a thirst for movement — and a fear of losing her footing. The chair becomes a symbol of this indecision: an almost sacred object where the fear of the finale and the awe of the beginning intersect. A sculptural bust in the viewer's mind is an extremely specific, portrait image of an individual, but in the work of Konstantin von Riben his face is hidden. The red balaclava mask made of glass beads dissolves the personal, turning the hero into a collective and anonymous sign. But the mask doesn't just hide the face, it's like a curved mirror crushing the image: each ball refracts the world, creating hundreds of incompatible reflections. The viewer cannot try it on — the self crumbles, losing its solidity. The work reflects our era: identity is no longer carved in stone, but assembled from fragile, mobile particles, like a kaleidoscope. We appear not as statues of the past, but as temporary, shimmering clusters without clear boundaries — faceless busts in masks. The black granite boot with its chopped shapes materializes the pressure. His heaviness and angularity embody all the must hanging on a person: he must work. Must match. It must be strong, successful, and comfortable. I owe it to my family, my career, my community, and myself. The boot here is a visualization of obligations, a burden that cannot be shed. Granite is cold and motionless. It does not bend, it does not adapt. You can't walk in such shoes — you can only stand under its weight. Perhaps the answer is hidden in the hard stone: to free yourself, you need to stop moving in other people's directions. Konstantin von Riben carves iconic symbols of consumption in stone. This is how a white marble sneaker turns into a monument not to a hero, but to the obsession of having: possession appears as a form of captivity. The whiteness of marble is a sarcophagus for a fleeting fashion that ironically leaves the momentary frozen in eternity.
The desire for possession has petrified. There is no movement in the marble gravity — only the dead weight of status. It is impossible to escape in these chains, you can only stand under the weight of your own desire — an eternal monument to the thirst to own. The ear is always open to the world, and sometimes we trust hearing more than sight. What you hear penetrates right into the depths. But often the noise of the era falls into an open channel through a mudflow: an overdose of words, data, and worries. Granite, contrasting with the fragility of hearing, turns into a symbol of the armor that consciousness has built up, trying to isolate itself from the stream. Maybe ancient amulet earrings can protect you from endless noise? But they are also powerless, only petrification saves from noise, but makes you deaf to the present: to silence, to whispers, to the voice of the soul.
