Rotations

Rotations is a looped vertical HD video projection with sound that traces the shifting iconography of the bird of prey—from emblem of sovereign power to instrument of contemporary spectacle and branding. Centred on the controlled movements of trained falcons, the work examines how these animals, once embedded within aristocratic ritual and heraldic systems, became visual shorthand for authority, dominance, and territorial identity.

Historically associated with nobility and governance, birds of prey occupied a privileged position within the symbolic language of the state. As early “luxury objects” of European elites, falcons and hawks signified control over nature as much as over subjects, their presence extending into coats of arms and national insignia. In Rotations, this legacy is reframed through choreography: the birds’ circular, repetitive movements echo systems of training and discipline, mirroring the structures through which power is performed and maintained.

Cibic situates the moving image in dialogue with sculptural plinths—replicas of canonical 20th-century design objects—foregrounding the relationship between display, status, and value. These supports operate simultaneously as architectural accessories and ideological frames, underscoring how objects, like symbols, accrue meaning through context and presentation. The falcon, like the plinth, becomes both subject and ornament, suspended between function and representation.

Through this interplay, Rotations exposes the continuity between historical emblems of authority and their contemporary appropriations within commercial and political imagery. The bird of prey, once a marker of imperial and national power, re-emerges in logos, luxury branding, and tourist spectacle—its symbolic charge diluted yet persistently operative. Cibic draws attention to this slippage, revealing how visual languages of dominance are repackaged and circulated within new economies of desire.

At the same time, the work retains a lyrical undercurrent. The falcons’ movements—precise, restrained, and cyclical—suggest both mastery and captivity, evoking a quiet tension between natural instinct and imposed control. In this sense, Rotations functions as both critique and elegy: a meditation on the transformation of powerful symbols into aesthetic commodities, and on the fragile boundary between freedom and display.