British artist Edmund de Waal is perhaps most known for incorporation of ceramics in his installations, which demonstrate his interest in probing the boundaries between architecture, fine art and objects of everyday use.At his exhibition “Irrkunst” at the two venues of Galerie Max Hetzler, de Waal connects through his artworks with the city of Berlin and its history. De Waal takes his inspiration from the writings of German-Jewish philosopher and critic, Walter Benjamin, who has described his earliest memories of living in the German capital in an essay, “A Berlin Childhood Around 1900.” Benjamin compares the act of writing a memoir to excavations at an archaeological site: “He who seeks to approach his buried past must conduct himself like a man digging.”De Waal likewise constructs his installations as abandoned sites, “re-discovered” by the viewer. “fundbüro” (2016, 14 porcelain vessels and porcelain shards in an aluminum and Plexiglas vitrine) consists of a cabinet displaying ceramic dishes in various state of disrepair. The title of the installation hints at a “lost and found” service. De Waal’s work explores the eerie quality of the so called “déjà vu,” which transforms everyday household objects into vessels of memory.In “Irrkunst,” de Waal negotiates between the modernist attachment to memory and post-modern rejection of its sentimental value. The delicate nature of the porcelain objects hints at the fragile nature of our memories. At the same time, the imposing, cryptic cabinets containing the dishes are symbols of the unknown and forever lost.Edmund de Waal: “Irrkunst” is on show at Galerie Max Hetzler, Bleibtreustraße 45 and Goethestraße 2/3,10623, Berlin, through July 16, 2016. For more information see http://www.maxhetzler.com/
↧