Jean Michel Wicker, Michael Kleine
E D’ambiente
03 Oct - 13 Dec 2015
Jean Michel Wicker, Michael Kleine
E D’AMBIENTE
3 October – 13 December 2015
Smoke is the central stuff and structuring device of e d’ambiente, an exhibition by Jean-Michel Wicker staged with Michael Kleine. The smoke is approached as a screen, acting for or giving space, whilst lifting and removing information. e d’ambiente is a survey of sorts, but also a conversation between Wicker and Kleine and the articulation and enjoyment of a series of moods.
The show exploits the vertical architecture of the Künstlerhaus across two floors, and foregrounds through newly realised and existing works, a long-running engagement with the circuitous language of contemporary desire. Since the early 1990s Wicker’s prolific production has moved across publication, typography, sculpture, gardening and performance: slow and fast forms of circulation and release. A key component of the articulation of the publications, kinetic sculptures and floor sculpture / dance floor is a scenography staged by Wicker and Kleine. The newly realised setting dialogues with the symmetries and dissymmetries of the publication and sculptural display. The setup also strips down and transforms a structure originally conceived by architect Simon Jones, keeping the skeleton of the Salon and introducing its core to a carefully orchestrated set of connections across space and surface: relations between atmosphere, smoke, weight and scale. Here newly conceived works are also inserted into, and function as parts of the decor, including a photographic suite of Wicker’s anti-live performance nr. 2 framed in bright primaries. In terms of material and spatial decisions, the e d’ambiente scenography is shaped by the background and context of Michael Kleine’s work, which is formulated within a setting of opera and theatre. In his productions, Kleine often returns to the relation with the viewer, and how degrees of intimacy shift and unfold across time.
As an invitation, e d’ambiente carries forth a central practice of slowing down and speeding up the reading of positions. It is a process where also the rhythms and forms of circulation are an integral part of their aesthetic and political concerns: a parable and strong desire for change.
In parallel with e d’ambiente at Künstlerhaus Stuttgart, Jean-Michel Wicker is presenting the exhibition futurbella at Bergen Kunsthall (30 October–16 December). These two, related, exhibitions represent Wicker’s biggest institutional presentations to date and are regarded by the artist as an integrated project distributed over two distinct spaces and sites.
E D’AMBIENTE
3 October – 13 December 2015
Smoke is the central stuff and structuring device of e d’ambiente, an exhibition by Jean-Michel Wicker staged with Michael Kleine. The smoke is approached as a screen, acting for or giving space, whilst lifting and removing information. e d’ambiente is a survey of sorts, but also a conversation between Wicker and Kleine and the articulation and enjoyment of a series of moods.
The show exploits the vertical architecture of the Künstlerhaus across two floors, and foregrounds through newly realised and existing works, a long-running engagement with the circuitous language of contemporary desire. Since the early 1990s Wicker’s prolific production has moved across publication, typography, sculpture, gardening and performance: slow and fast forms of circulation and release. A key component of the articulation of the publications, kinetic sculptures and floor sculpture / dance floor is a scenography staged by Wicker and Kleine. The newly realised setting dialogues with the symmetries and dissymmetries of the publication and sculptural display. The setup also strips down and transforms a structure originally conceived by architect Simon Jones, keeping the skeleton of the Salon and introducing its core to a carefully orchestrated set of connections across space and surface: relations between atmosphere, smoke, weight and scale. Here newly conceived works are also inserted into, and function as parts of the decor, including a photographic suite of Wicker’s anti-live performance nr. 2 framed in bright primaries. In terms of material and spatial decisions, the e d’ambiente scenography is shaped by the background and context of Michael Kleine’s work, which is formulated within a setting of opera and theatre. In his productions, Kleine often returns to the relation with the viewer, and how degrees of intimacy shift and unfold across time.
As an invitation, e d’ambiente carries forth a central practice of slowing down and speeding up the reading of positions. It is a process where also the rhythms and forms of circulation are an integral part of their aesthetic and political concerns: a parable and strong desire for change.
In parallel with e d’ambiente at Künstlerhaus Stuttgart, Jean-Michel Wicker is presenting the exhibition futurbella at Bergen Kunsthall (30 October–16 December). These two, related, exhibitions represent Wicker’s biggest institutional presentations to date and are regarded by the artist as an integrated project distributed over two distinct spaces and sites.