NULLVERSUCH, 2015
Located at
Kunstverein Ahlen
Königstraße 7
59227 Ahlen
Spatial Installation
with digital pigment prints,
everyday objects,
tools, colored geometric schematic elements & 2 experiment diaries
Variable dimensions
Two experiment diaries, in which the experiment lasting several weeks was developed and documented as part of a scholarship in the artists’ village of Schöppingen in 2011, form the starting point for the installation, which is related to the specific exhibition space.
The title of the installation Nullversuch – in the actual sense a reference experiment to calibrate a measuring apparatus – refers ambiguously to the model of scientific experimentation.
The famous experiment on the refraction of light becomes the point of reference for this artistic experiment, which is also a reflection on the nature of photography. For both the scientific experiment and photography are by their very nature constructs and conditioned by the visuality of the respective time. Since the photographic fixation of the image also takes place via a beam of light, a connection is established between the artistic and the scientific experiment. The experiment goes through various stages: the stage of the genesis of the experiment, the performative stage, the stage of recording and evaluation. The experiment is intuitively developed further. Visual materials from the real experiment serve as confirmation, so that levels of reality such as action and reflection, vision and history, everyday and artificial laboratory worlds, play and mechanism, formulaic language and sketches become intertwined and interdependencies become visible.
The space in which the experiment takes place changes it. Photographing the experiment becomes part of the experiment and leads to its independence. Transport containers, tools from the set-up and everyday objects belonging to the artist become an integral part of the installation and refer to the worldly integration and detachment of scientific methodology. It becomes clear that scientific research is based on a paradox from the outset.
The installation as a module adapts to the respective exhibition space and its conditions.
Nullversuch, Experiment diary, 2011
Sketchbook, Printouts, ballpoint pen, fineliner on paper
