Marcus Geiger, 1998, Photo: Matthias Herrmann


In his recent artistic interventions Marcus Geiger (who was born in 1957 in Muri, Switzerland) investigates the concept of the "art work" as such and even provocatively queries its significance. His projects in recent years, where he favoured materials such as terry cloth (hand towels, dressing gowns, home-made suits, etc.) and felt, seem to have been prompted more by a sense of irony than anything else. In the context of the present-day art business, the decision to utilise materials, which (as a result of their widespread role in advertising) evoke associations of cosiness and intimate homeliness and privacy, only serves to strengthen the satiric content of these works. However, this is contradicted by the obviously time-consuming technique required and the formal precision with which Marcus Geiger treats these chosen materials. As a result, Marcus Geiger's installations seem to quite consciously enter into the cleft between the everyday object and the work of art and offer the viewer an experience that cannot be tied down to one particular interpretation.

The work Marcus Geiger conceived for his one-man-show in the Secession also deals with the hundred year history of exhibition in the Secession. A mosaic-like felt carpet is laid over the entire 600 sqm floor area of the Main Hall showing a computer graphic representing the "Hostile Powers" in Gustav Klimt's "Beethoven Frieze". Other smaller carpets displaying motifs from past exhibitions, as well as further elements and activities that evolved in part during the course of these exhibitions are distributed throughout the exhibition space and supplement Marcus Geiger's show.


PUBLICATION

MARCUS GEIGER 20 pages, 30 colored illustrations, 22 b/w illustrations author: Werner Würtinger Secession 1998, ISBN 3-900803-98-6 ___________________ available in the shop

We would like to thank:
KUNST BUNDESKANZLERAMT
WIEN KULTUR
Glaxo Wellcome
FUNDER WERKE
FRIENDS OF THE SECESSION

ELISABETH GRÜBL

EXHIBITION PROGRAM 1998

For further information and photographic material please contact:
 
Tamara Schwarzmayr
Secession, Association of Visual Artists Vienna Secession
Friedrichstraße 12, 1010 Vienna
Tel: +43-1-5875307-21, Fax: +43-1-5875307-34
presse@secession.at