Landschaft = Labor
Exhibition MMKK Klagenfurt 2016/17
intro
Landschaft = Labor [landscape = laboratory]
In the exhibition Landschaft = Labor, the Carinthian Museum of Modern Art/MMKK presented for the first time – in the context of selected international artistic positions – a comprehensive show of works by Austrian artist, Herwig Turk
Herwig Turk‘s work is based on his examination of complex scientific themes. The material culture of the high-tech laboratory is seen as a complex environment, in which the significance of the term landscape is reflected; a landscape that, between political determination and industrial instrumentalisation, becomes an experimental laboratory. Thus, the terms "laboratory" and "landscape" blend seamlessly in the exhibition. The artist dissects a variety of tales from laboratory life on the one hand, and on the other, explores civilizational connections and colonial exploitation methods within the concept of landscape. The pictorial and object worlds generated by Herwig Turk thereby refer to traditional patterns of representation, which call in question both stereotypes of landscape painting and forms of portrait painting.
In the exhibition at the MMKK, Herwig Turk's work undergoes a contextual expansion, through the dialogue with works from the Museum's collection itself on the one hand, and on the other, through a selection of artworks which hark back to related artistic strategies and have a place in the scientific discourse on art.
Artists:
Herwig Turk in dialogue with Herbert Boeckl (A), Thomas Feuerstein (A), Cornelius Kolig (A), Gerhard Lang (G), Sonia Leimer (I), Kira O’Reilly (GB) & Jennifer Willett (CAN), Hannes Rickli (CH), Meina Schellander (A), Nicole Six & Paul Petritsch (A), The Center for Land Use Interpretation (US) and Gerhard Treml & Leo Calice (A).
exhibition 1
Landschaft = Labor, MMKK Museum Moderner Kunst Kärnten, Klagenfurt/A 2016
photo: © Gebhard Sengmüller
up left: linescape, 2016, up right: clymabay, 2013, second row left: uttr fence, 2014 und bonneville salt flats e, 2014, second row right: clymabay, 2013, hogup pumping station, 2014, third row left: labscapes 2007 & value/order, 2011, third row right: labscape 05, 2011, value/order, 2011, bottom: referenceless photography, 1998–2003.
exhibition 2
all photos:
Landschaft = Labor, MMKK Museum Moderner Kunst Kärnten, Klagenfurt/A 2016
photo: © Gebhard Sengmüller
up left: the conversation that never took place, 2013, up right: Kira O’Reilly & Jennifer Willett, Refolding (Laboratory Architectures), 2010, hands on, 2014, second row left: uttr fence 2014, second row right: bonneville salt flats e, 2014, Nicole Six & Paul Petritsch, Das Meer der Stille, 2015, third row left: twin hills, 2015, third row right: twin hills - detail, 2015, bottom left: tacit knowledge experiment 1, 2011, Cornelius Kolig, Variation des Plexiglasbaukastens, 1968, bottom right, Gerhard Treml & Leo Calice Eden´s Edge, 2014, lakeside, 2011
text
Landschaft = Labor [landscape = laboratory]
In the exhibition Landschaft = Labor, the Carinthian Museum of Modern Art/MMKK presented for the first time – in the context of selected international artistic positions – a comprehensive show of works by Austrian artist, Herwig Turk.
Herwig Turk‘s work is based on his examination of complex scientific themes. The material culture of the high-tech laboratory is seen as a complex environment, in which the significance of the term landscape is reflected; a landscape that, between political determination and industrial instrumentalisation, becomes an experimental laboratory. Thus, the terms "laboratory" and "landscape" blend seamlessly in the exhibition. The artist dissects a variety of tales from laboratory life on the one hand, and on the other, explores civilizational connections and colonial exploitation methods within the concept of landscape. The pictorial and object worlds generated by Herwig Turk thereby refer to traditional patterns of representation, which call in question both stereotypes of landscape painting and forms of portrait painting.
In the exhibition at the MMKK, Herwig Turk's work undergoes a contextual expansion, through the dialogue with works from the Museum's collection itself on the one hand, and on the other, through a selection of artworks which hark back to related artistic strategies and have a place in the scientific discourse on art.
The exhibition is accompanied by an extensive catalogue with numerous pictures and contributions by Ingeborg Reichle (media theorist, Berlin and Vienna), Christian Höller (art theorist, essayist, Vienna) and Andreas Krištof (curator, section.a), as well as a preface and a contribution by Christine Wetzlinger-Grundnig (curator, director MMKK) published by Verlag für moderne Kunst.
Artists:
Herwig Turk in dialogue with Herbert Boeckl (A), Thomas Feuerstein (A), Cornelius Kolig (A), Gerhard Lang (G), Sonia Leimer (I), Kira O’Reilly (GB) & Jennifer Willett (CAN), Hannes Rickli (CH), Meina Schellander (A), Nicole Six & Paul Petritsch (A), The Center for Land Use Interpretation (US) and Gerhard Treml & Leo Calice (A).