Smooth Art

At the beginning of 1997 Vera Vogelsberger presented an exhibition devoted entirely to the topic of material. Specifically, she was interested in a specific material property, namely softness. The ambivalence of the ideas triggered by the term 'soft' was a key intellectual moment in the preparations for the exhibition. On the one hand, the word appeared to have quite positive connotations, associated with well-being and harmlessness, but on the other hand it also had negative connotations, such as weakness or disgust. Then there was the additional element that softness is also associated with the possibility of a material change, caused for example by a physical action or by heat. The next factor became obvious, namely that a change in the material caused by warmth or heat is usually associated with a specific smell. The transformation, together with its material and olfactory properties, became the central theme for the exhibition. The three Austrian artists Max Böhme, Gabi Senn and Martin Walde gave the gallery premises a sensual and fragrant atmosphere, which in turn underwent a olfactory and material transformation over the six weeks of the exhibition.

Max Böhme applied a layer of make-up to the approximately 8 x 3 meter central wall in the exhibition space. In the middle of the room he connected the ceiling and the floor with a 3 meter long and 55 cm wide strip of thin, ocher-colored latex. Furthermore, Böhme expressed the softness and transformation possibilities of the body in 20 paintings using different techniques with his opulent painting style.

Gabi Senn's chocolate pictures made the material change from liquid and soft to hard and brittle visible. The softness was potential and unexpected, only on closer inspection or smell did one recognize the chocolate material. And only then did the production of the images and the possibility of melting or spoiling become an issue for the viewer.

Two sheets of wax lay on the floor and were heated by heat lamps. At Martin Walde, such softness was produced directly. The key moment is the transition between the two aggregate states 'solid' and 'liquid'. But just as important was the long-term transformation of the wax slabs through constant heating during the six weeks of the exhibition. Walde's Shrinking Bottles, Melting Bottles, in combination with the two wax sheets, embody transformation as the principle of his work.

For Vera Vogelsberger, the exhibition was also important because she saw it as an attempt to use softness to forget the fear of entering into art, to make it disappear or to make thresholds recognizable in order to subsequently strip them of their meaning or dismantle them. Instead of the confrontation, the selective concentration on a resistance, on a moment, the installations and works refer to processual possibilities of transformation in thinking and acting.

Text: Andrea Hörl

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