The Purloined Letter

"A dolphin touched by death floats heavily in The Purloined Letter, 1989. Below it, vague marine forms oscillate, and to the right is a translucent table, on which rests and open envelope. The composition establishes a general fluctuation of forms, with a corresponding ambiguity on the plane of signification. We are obliged to identify the elements of a riddle but have no means of solving it. If we think of the Edgar Allan Poe tale from which the title of this work is borrowed, and of the seminar Jacques Lacan dedicated to it, we may understand that for Sarmento, the issue is the untrustworthy unstable nature of the communication process. What is communicated is never what is meant to be communicated because all communication implies a deviation. This deviation results from seeing things others do not, or the inability of some to see things others can't help but see. This is also the game that is established between what is there to be seen in the world, what the artist sees, what the artist exposes and what the viewer sees." (G. Celant, in: Juliâo Sarmento, Milan 1997, p. 28.)