Funky Town

Kunstverein Gera, 2014

archival pigment prints, laser prints, photography on fabric, chipboard, video projection, photo collages on overhead projector, spot, mirror, coloured foil

The Bauhaus architecture in Gera, especially the designs of the architect Thilo Schoder, form the basis of the site-specific installation, Funky Town. For content, I linger for a while in the period of the 20s and 30s, jumping from the Bauhaus, a physical stage for the 20s, to Expressionism, Expressionism as a total work of art, for example in films such as the Cabinet of Dr. Caligari with its painted stage design, and finally landing in the Russian avant-garde. Furthermore, I combine these cultural movements with aspects from the sporting arena, as in the past, Gera has also made a name for itself in the world of sports. Here I found that during the 20s came the beginning of mass sports that included six days of exciting races. In my photoshoots I combine unusual fragments found while researching the various aspects of a work.

Golden Globes (inspired by an object in the Van der Velde house), bicycle spokes (sporting item), Bauhaus wallpapers (from original artwork), chipboard (as both a nod to the increasing vacancy rate in the city and as a material object in space in the photo): these are some of the images that I have further imposed with a color scheme. These colors, pink and yellow, are inspired by façade designs in Gera, referring to both new construction as well as to an appreciation of prefabricated housing. The other colors are zeitgeist trends, magenta, blue, yellow, orange. The photo collages in the back room on the overhead projectors are combinations of photos I’ve taken of architecture from Thilo Schoder in Gera that appear on films, collages, and intermingle with color films. And finally, an object made of colored films hangs in space from a disco ball motor that through the broken mirror, is constantly rotating to generate a special spotlight of new areas of color on the wall.