On the screen, a stuttering young man recites, in reverse order, the articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights; we listen to him comfortably settled in modern-designed armchairs (Swan and Egg, designed by Arne Jacobsen, 1957–58). The man’s stuttering disturbs the comfort of the viewer, who makes an extra effort to follow this strange recitation of the declarative discourse. The reading by a stutterer of the seventeen articles of the Declaration is the expression of an obstinate and perservering speech and expresses a right to be different. It is significant in the respect that the text of Human Rights, which originally was the accomplished expression of universalism, states a difficulty with individual existence. Even more significant, this installation claims the right to difference through the experience of slowness at a time when we are all subjected to the imperative of promptness and performance. The slow timing of the recitation requires tolerance and patience from listeners. It forces us to concentrate on the statements. At the same time, Sterbak’s work emphasizes how little we know about the text of the Declaration and expresses an anxiousness about the social responsibility of the individual.

A Czech-born Canadian artist, Jana Sterbak lives and works in Montreal and Barcelona. Since 1978, her multiform and complex work focused on the human body has regularly been featured in exhibitions, both in Canada and abroad. Her work has been included in many group and solo exhibitions, notably at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Musée d'art moderne de Sainte-Étienne in France, Galeria Antoni Tàpies in Barcelona, and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago. After the MOLMA Kunsthall in Sweden, the Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal will hold, in 2003, a retrospective exhibition of her work. Sterbak's works, imbued with surrealism, treat such subjects as power, seduction, and sexuality with humour and irony.