Erik Steinbrecher, LES CHEVEUX DE MONSIEUR ROUSSEAU, 2011

The wall piece Unterstand links (Shelter left; 2003) by Erik Steinbrecher has been exhibited in the stairwell of the Ricola marketing building in Laufen for several years. The work can be seen from outside through a large window. The stairwell connects the checkroom and the rear entrance to the upper floor. The window is reminiscent of a shop window. The artist used the window gallery as a way to address in his work the urban context associated with the construction of the building. The marketing building stands in a garden at the edge of an estate of detached houses. These surroundings, as well as the ivy and Virginia creeper that grow in the rooftop garden and hang down over the facade, are reflected in the window of the stairwell. Unterstand links (2003) is constructed like a canopy; however, it is inside and is made up of fence posts painted white. The work is not simply an affectionate yet ironic comment on the building’s banal architectural surroundings, but primarily a powerful, poetic image of the situation the architects created by combining the garden and pavilion.

Steinbrecher is an architect and artist. He was born in 1963, grew up in Basel and has lived and worked in Berlin for many years now. His works (photography, objects, installations) direct our attention, for example, to mobile architecture, such as fences, garden sheds, tents or cars, or address industrially produced components from the DIY store, modules of cheap prefabricated architecture with designs that pretend to have been created and made by an artisan. He explores this store of anonymous everyday aesthetics to find elements that can be used in his art. [...]


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Art from Switzerland