WALKING & FALLING

“You're walking. And you don't always realize it, but you're always falling. With each step, you fall forward slightly. And then catch yourself from falling. Over and over, you're falling. And then catching yourself from falling. And this is how you can be walking and falling at the same time.” Laurie Anderson from the album Big Science 1982

"With each step you fall forward slightly. And then catch yourself from falling." In Laurie Anderson’s quote, the everyday is paramount. Her observation on walking, on how we unconsciously are falling with every step, constitutes the point of departure for this exhibition, both as an observation and as a metaphor for life. Our sense of balance, the precondition for our ability to walk, also plays a central role in this exhibition.

The works in this exhibition have a poetic, contemplative, and surrealistic affinity to her quote. Rebecca Horn was fascinated by the way a woman walked and created a unicorn costume for her. During the early 1970s, Horn worked with costumes that elongated the shoulders, fingers, or head and emphasized the body’s movements. In “Walking 9-5 Amsterdam” (2001), Danica Phelps exchanges ”working” with ”walking.” She walked every day for a month from 9 am to 5 pm, an average workday. Bruce Nauman has examined walking in a number of performance pieces — he has been stamping in his studio, walked in an exaggerated manner and in various patterns. Vangelis Vlahos and Sigalit Landau challenge our sense of balance. In Vlahos’s video “Untitled Knight 1” (1997), a knight in shining armor roller-skates in a gymnastics hall, while Landau stands balanced on a watermelon in the Dead Sea.

All the participating artists are represented in Magasin 3’s permanent collection but several of the works have been borrowed for “Walking & Falling”.

Anna Gaskell (US), Ann Hamilton (US), Rebecca Horn (DE), Sigalit Landau (IL), Richard Long (UK), Bruce Nauman (US), Danica Phelps (US), Sam Taylor-Wood (UK), Vangelis Vlahos (GR) Curators: Elisabeth Millqvist and Tessa Praun

Pressetext

WALKING & FALLING
Kuratoren: Elisabeth Millqvist, Tessa Praun

mit Anna Gaskell, Ann Hamilton, Rebecca Horn, Sigalit Landau, Richard Long, Bruce Nauman, Danica Phelps, Sam Taylor-Wood, Vangelis Vlahos