Sven Johne - 52 glückliche Orte / 52 happy places
01 Nov - 20 Dec 2008
52 glückliche Orte / 52 happy places, exhibition view KLEMM'S, Berlin
52 glückliche Orte / 52 happy places, exhibition view KLEMM'S, Berlin
52 glückliche Orte / 52 happy places, exhibition view KLEMM'S, Berlin
Letzte Wärter, 2008, seven portraits, oil on plywood, framed with engraved brass plates, each 40 x 30 cm
52 happ places, 2008, pigment ink onm Hahnemühle fineart paper, each 25 x 25 cm, complete block 350 x 106 cm
Sven Johne has approached the fateful relationship of the individual to social
distortions and economic development in his image-text-cycles and video pieces, in
which he always conflates personal stories with actual history, precise observation
and pointedly invention.
How do identities and life-concepts change and modify under these circumstances
and how free is a person to decide upon his or her being? Building upon the gesture
of collecting and reproduction and trusting in fictional-atmospheric elements Johne
opens the stage for fates and absurdities of today and frames them in a concrete
and tangible way.
The current exhibition 52 glückliche Orte / 52 happy places gathers works that are
revolving around the everlasting quest for the Other, the Better or maybe the
Utopian. Can one reach in this "society of efficiency and velocity" (Johne) a
satisfying life? Is solidarity still topical? And can one still imagine fulfillment and
happiness? The exhibition space becomes now a projections space for these
questions and opens a cosmos that withdraws from any concrete phrasing. The
narration starts in the viewer’s mind when the last still living lighthouse guards of
Germany appear in a line of ancestors at the wall; or when there is no land to
discover on the maps of modern seafaring. In one of the exhibited works Sven
Johne follows the tracks of an amateur cave explorer, who seeks knowledge in New
York’s underground. Furthermore, he has sent seven messages in a bottle to the
oceans: they are stories of stagnancy that tell of humans in waiting position or of
gestures of refusal.
Opening hours: Tue. - Sat. 11-18 h
distortions and economic development in his image-text-cycles and video pieces, in
which he always conflates personal stories with actual history, precise observation
and pointedly invention.
How do identities and life-concepts change and modify under these circumstances
and how free is a person to decide upon his or her being? Building upon the gesture
of collecting and reproduction and trusting in fictional-atmospheric elements Johne
opens the stage for fates and absurdities of today and frames them in a concrete
and tangible way.
The current exhibition 52 glückliche Orte / 52 happy places gathers works that are
revolving around the everlasting quest for the Other, the Better or maybe the
Utopian. Can one reach in this "society of efficiency and velocity" (Johne) a
satisfying life? Is solidarity still topical? And can one still imagine fulfillment and
happiness? The exhibition space becomes now a projections space for these
questions and opens a cosmos that withdraws from any concrete phrasing. The
narration starts in the viewer’s mind when the last still living lighthouse guards of
Germany appear in a line of ancestors at the wall; or when there is no land to
discover on the maps of modern seafaring. In one of the exhibited works Sven
Johne follows the tracks of an amateur cave explorer, who seeks knowledge in New
York’s underground. Furthermore, he has sent seven messages in a bottle to the
oceans: they are stories of stagnancy that tell of humans in waiting position or of
gestures of refusal.
Opening hours: Tue. - Sat. 11-18 h