To Protect Us From What We Seek
A body of work including hand knotted carpets, a series of drawings with embroidery, paper cut outs, silk paper sculptures and graphite drawings
selected exhibitions
Mount Analogue | Lucia Kempkes & Ossian Fraser | Kunstverein Arnsberg | 2020
To Protect Us From What We Seek | Kommunale Galerie Berlin | Berlin | 2022
Protect Us From What We Seek | New Viewings | Galerie Barbara Thumm | 2020
TAPESTRIES | Paragliders transformed into carpets
The tapestries were made by using the fabric of one entire paraglider and wool. The glider was flown once over the Alps in Switzerland, cut, and sent to the Atlas Mountains in Morrocco. There, they were transformed into hand-knotted carpets. Started in 2018, the production of eight tapestries was on hold till 2023 due to COVID.
The Hybrid Tapestries refer to two opposite sentiments in material, objects, and technique: First, the free choice of the fortunate to risk one's life taking part in extreme sports, because the idea of death is not a lived reality. High-tech RipStop nylon, a paraglider, flying. Second, the sometimes unreachable goal is to create a home, a safe space to rest, to share with one's community, and to preserve life: wool, carpets, hand-knotting, and weaving.
The purpose of extreme sports equipment is to push our bodies to places in which they could naturally not go. They exist to simultaneously take us to the precipice of death while keeping us safe. Adrenaline is the goal, but also to remain unharmed. High-tech textiles and machines protect us from what we seek. There is no rule about what a home looks like, or where it is. The idea of home is an ideological space that gives safety, that provides shelter, and is yours to enter whenever you please. You are welcomed and loved there. If one does not have a safe home, risking one's life crossing mountain ranges or oceans will define you in the eye of society not as an admirable adventurer but as a refugee. Hero or outcast, it depends on the fact if you potentially have a safe home to return to, simple as that..
The project started in June 2018 with a research residency in Marrakesh by invitation of Aniko M. E. Boehler and is supported by the Summit Foundation Vevey, Switzerland, Gwaertler Stiftung Switzerland, a NEUSTART Kultur by Stiftung Kunstfonds Bonn and a research grant bei Berliner Senat.
This body of work would not be possible without Aniko M.E. Boehler.
DRAWINGS | Paper cutouts and embroidery on color pencil drawings
The complementary drawings of this body of works show a paraglider in distress, falling, and probably crashing. The leashes of the original paragliders (above) are embroidered and tangled, cutouts highlight the fragility of the falling gliders. The colors refer to the gliders transformed.
SILK PAPER SCULPTURES | Replica of outdoor equipment in original size
To Protect Us From What We Seek also features a series of sculptures made entirely out of silkpaper. The objects, all white, are like a blueprint for an object created to protect us, stripped from their purpose and strenght. The only thing left is the shape and form of the outdoor tools, like an empty cocoon.
The series includes different outdoor jackets, Sleepingbags (unpacked and packed) Backpags and Paraglider.
ERASOR DRAWINGS
A series of drawings erasing the adventurer from outdoor brand advertisements, leaving the landscape untouched.
