Current Exhibitions

Unnatural History – Überflügelt is an allegorical reflection on how collective ideas and beliefs, conscious and unconscious, manipulate the body. The allegorical images of modified insect specimens sometimes depict 'nodes' of symbolised, or sometimes quite plain, conditions of contmeporary technologised society. These nodes are often outlined in the works' titles.

Individuals and collectives attempt to [re-]impower themselves, or exert power over other beings, by modifying and manipulating their own, or other beings' bodies. Conscious and unconscious beliefs and desires are often manifested through bodies from within, as physical symptoms, chronic disease or some form of surgery.

Biomedical science is becoming more indistinguishable from cosmetic 'lifestyle' surgery and both are trying to further improve the physical manipulation of the body, trying to remedy internal dis-ease. Another whole branch of science is trying to manifest dated sci-fi 'beliefs' by turning organisms into machines with the professed aim to cure, or control 'something', to help humanity, much like the 'green revolution' was set to fix world hunger.

Central to this is human urge to control matter on the outside, to 'fix' and control the fear of an emotional, and intangible inner reality.

Unnatural History is placed within the tension between collective 'Zivilisationskritik' and personal self-critique, and an acknowledgement of the metaphysical nature of physical life, and source energy.

REFERENCES:
1. Coil, “Unnatural History” I-III, CDs, 1990, 1995, 1997, Threshold House, UK; (continuity link to the musical titles of the Krautrock series)
2. Max Ernst, “Histoire Naturelle”, series of frottages, 1925/26
3. Damien Hirst, “Natural History”, 2007, White Space, London; exhibition of paintings and [more] very large interfered-with creatures
4. Kafka, Franz; “The Metamorphosis”, 1915, Leipzig
5. Lem, Stanisław; The Futurological Congress (Kongres Futurologiczny), 1971, Poland:

The scanning process:

These images are made with a desktop scanner with open lid, in my dark studio, which turns the whole arrangement into a sort of 'camera obscura'. The tableaux of the glass plate turns the viewing axis from up/down to forth and what the mind perceives as background is, in this case, light and space: Rhythmic adding and subtracting of ambient light source(s) results in a 'light-strip-waveform-barcode pattern' which at times creates a false sense of space or perspective. The process of manually and clumsily switching a very bright light on and off by it's plug, in synch with the soundtrack to the respective image, utilises the movement of the scan's 'space-time exposure' and adds both, another dimension, and a (nerdy) performance element to the static image of the scan (I bob to the music, too). The resulting pattern is a manual, visual and binary/digital transcript of music relevant to my reading of the scanned object. This links the images to the KrautRock series and my ongoing interest in the cross-pollination of music and visual arts.