Opening of the installation S.T. Orbea (Orduña)

S.T. Orbea (Orduña) is a 42-minute video about the recording of an everyday object, a racing bicycle – specifically, the “Orduña” model, named after a place in Bizkaia province – that was produced by the Basque firm Orbea between 1970 and 1980.

The piece explores the specificity of the object, following a methodology of analytical and structural recording, i.e. a process in which the narrative and the camera movements – running over the different parts of the bicycle – become a formal operation; a device that maximises the tension between repetition and the distinctiveness of any bicycle. Non-narrative, or anti-narrative, it could be said that S.T. Orbea (Orduña) calls attention to itself, self-referentially, just as minimalist art did when it emphasised its own iconic objectuality. As a result, the video concentrates on creating a dialogue between the object examined, the time the camera stays on the object and the moving image resulting from this close inspection.

Chasing up the name of the maker, one might easily find that this family firm was originally founded in 1847 in Eibar, in the Basque Country, as a manufacturer of rifles and pistols, but after the Spanish Civil War it changed its business, some years later becoming the leading bicycle maker in Spain. However, in S.T. Orbea (Orduña) this historical description is not explained. The camera lovingly contemplates the assemblies of components adapted to the nature of this technological object.