Manfred Erjautz: Exhibition View, Photo Matthias Herrmann


The works by Manfred Erjautz treat the experiences of the individual within such constantly interweaving and mutually irritating fields as inside and outside, private and public, and they undertake compensatory attempts to establish a positioning of the individual person in these fields and thereby resist a patent overtaxing.



Me/We, 2002, neon logo, street lamp, Photo Matthias Herrmann


In a continuation of earlier works, which indicated the possible emptiness of aesthetic codes with accumulatively used logos, Manfred Erjautz has developed his own logo for the exhibition at the Secession. A neon lamp in the shape of his initials ME hangs at the foot of a streetlight, which perforates the roof construction of the Secession. As a result of the paradoxical illumination situation, an allegorical WE appears on the floor as a faint shadow of the ME. The ego produces a community itself, which it immediately outshines. What dimension does the personality have in relation to the public, and how is the public constructed, if every discretion revolving around the person vanishes? How can one position oneself and move in a world of illusory relationships and circumstances?


   
Converse Exit 01, 2002, C-Print on aluminum,
Photo Matthias Herrmann


The intervention that Erjautz undertakes in the exhibition space is to be seen in the sense of these questions. Replacing the door in the back wall of the main room with a plate of glass opens up and expands the space. A marble snowman placed in the space outside is revealed to the gaze. The suggestion of nearness, the apparent possibility of entering the garden and the simultaneously unbridgeable distance that is created through this architectonic intervention find a counterpart in the outside sculpture "Gefangen in der Gegenwart" ["Trapped in the Present"].



TK 1, 2002, Lego, carbonic acid, in cooperation
with Thomas Köhler, Photo Matthias Herrmann


The view that cuts through the main room is contrapuntally continued with large format photographs showing, among other things, window and door situations. In their sculptural, architectonic formation, they construct a complex spatiality, which dissolves the fixed viewpoint of the central perspective. The passages atmospherically flooded with light are the result of a long process of image development, in which Manfred Erjautz first notes his motifs in drawings before seeking a correspondence in reality and then capturing it photographically. Diffusely modulated and blurred, the pictures demonstrate the extent to which the world outside reflects one's own imagination and can no longer be brought into focus by the knowing gaze from mental space.



Locked in Presence, 2000/2002, marble, aluminum, stainless steel,
Photo Matthias Herrmann


Rebellion against an outside that cannot be grasped and rage expressed in violence as a reaction to the violated shelter zone of the private sphere are the theme of the slide series "Gunshot". With no recognizable adversary, the artists shoots wildly in his studio with a gun made of Lego, until he finally sinks to the floor, hit by return fire from an unidentifiable source. Although no counterpart can be unmasked, the result is exhaustion, an effort drained of power, the bullet lodged in nothingness.


PUBLICATION

MANFRED ERJAUTZ 32 pages, 20 colored illustrations author: Matthias Herrmann Secession 2002, ISBN 3-901926-39-9 ___________________ available in the shop

MANFRED ERJAUTZ, born 1966, lives and works in Vienna. Solo exhibitions (selected): 2001 Was noch? Galerie Grita Insam, Vienna 1999 Neue Galerie am Landesmuseum Johanneum, Graz; Kunsthalle Szombathely; Patricia Faure Gallery, Santa Monica (with Werner Reiterer, Michael Kienzer) 1998 Ausstellungsraum Mezzanin, Vienna (with Michael Kienzer); Studio Stefania Miscetti, Rome (with Michael Kienzer) 1997 Galerie Fotohof, Salzburg; Group exhibitions (selected): 2001 Connecting Worlds - Contemporary Sculpture from the EU, Kennedy Center, Washington; L.A. International Biennial; 2000 Delay, Forum Stadtpark, Graz; Living and Working in Vienna, Kunsthalle Wien; Resistance: Art and Politics from Austria, Art Space Rhizom, Aårhus; Fotografie - die Sammlung, Neue Galerie der Stadt Linz 1999 Rosa für Jungs - Hellblau für Mädchen, Neue Gesellschaft für Bildende Kunst, Berlin; 6/7, The Living Museum, Reykjavik

 
EXHIBITION DISCUSSION
Sunday, April 14, 2002, 3 p.m. involving Manfred Erjautz and Rainer Fuchs

HIER IST DORT 2

EXHIBITION PROGRAM 2002

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