Kirstine Roepstorff (DK) and Kirsten
Pieroth (D)
Press photos
January 20. - February 10.
2001
Sparwasser HQ is pleased to
begin the new year with an exhibition of works by artists Kirstine
Roepstorff (1972) and Kirsten Pieroth (1970). Each artist presents
two new pieces, incorporating materials as diverse as water and
yarn, and employing media ranging from photography to silkscreen
printing. Through their work with everyday objects and words,
Roepstorff and Pieroth explore the transformation of materials
and the meanings attached to them.
In her works, Pieroth destabilizes
the origin of an object by changing its use and adding to it,
physically, other functions. She alters the perception of the
object and the associations to it in order to make room for new
inscriptions of value.
"Kreuzberger
Pfütze" is the title of a piece by Pieroth exhibited
in the basement of Sparwasser HQ. Pfütze" means puddle;
Sparwasser means "spared water." The title describes
the project: Pieroth has moved a puddle from Kreuzberg to Sparwasser
HQ, thereby removing the puddle from its original spatial context.
The transferred puddle is, in its fluidity, a signifier of endless
reshaping.
"Kreuzberger Pfütze"
resembles a scientific experiment. This scientific approach is
characteristic also of Pieroth's second work, "Reaktion
von grauen Tauben auf graue Socken während der Fütterung
(Humboldthain)" ("Gray pigeons reacting to gray socks
while being fed (Humboldthain)"), a series of seven photographs
documenting a situation created by the artist in Humboldthain
Park, Berlin. Pieroth placed fourteen pairs of worn-out, gray
socks among the food for the pigeons and observed how the birds
approached and reacted to these strange new elements in their
environment.
For Roepstorff, the transformation
of meaning is inherent in the physical manifestations of her
works. Using straightforward materials such as yarn, pushpins,
and silkscreen prints, she creates works that appear fragile
at first glance.
Roepstorff's installation is
a fine, white representation of symmetrical window frames, displayed
in a hermetically sealed room of the gallery. With yarn, Roepstorff
draws an illusionary room, in 1:1 scale, an alternative to existing
space. The illusion almost disappears; the white yarn dissolves
permanent, physical form, suggesting alternatives for shaping
our environments.
A critique of the human desire
to organize and map reality is voiced also in "Out of the
Blue," a series of 25 delicate silkscreen prints depicting
chains of words. In each print, the meaning of the first word
is transformed gradually, through a series of synonyms, ending
in its opposition - e.g. from hate to love, from desire to disgust.
Blue text printed on white surfaces, the result is a fragile
and unstable picture, because the words are barely visible in
their different shades. Underneath the delicate surface, however,
an insistence on the honest and simple circumstances of human
experience is discernable, the words become a naive mapping of
the register of feelings at our disposal.
Text: Henrikke Nielsen, Solvej Helweg Ovesen.