FAQs

How do you assemble your shows?

Rooms can be very hard nuts to crack—for instance, the side gallery at the Lehmbruck Museum. A forty-meter-long tube; the side that faces the street is a long row of windows, the other side is a dark brick wall. A theatrical setting for the museum, difficult to deal with. There was no budget for my project there, but there was a stipend, and the director asked me to simply show what I had made in the studio. But I always think about the viewer when planning my shows: what kind of experience am I inviting visitors to have? What can I possibly do with my work here, specifically? Frequently, I start out right away with the entrance, and block any open access. I developed and built works specifically for the Lehmbruck Museum: a bluish, shimmering wall-snake, seconded by a connecting piece and a conduit made of insulation foam.
In some exhibitions, I show just one work, which has to cut to the chase. For shows like the one in Drogheda, I assembled a tour of various works, sort of like a sculptural obstacle course. Here, I let the various materials, formats, forms, and surfaces collide, as you do in a collage. Small next to big, smooth next to crumpled, a hole next to a mural, a blockade in front of a mobile—spaces are narrowed, things strewn about and constricted, objects balancing each other out, or emphasized. I prefer to avoid all too obvious references, or predetermined themes and settings like the overpowering altar. Mostly, I ignore those things. References are too easily illustrative, which is stifling, and makes it harder to actively perceive and decode.