Ernst Caramelle

As part of the GI Festival, Mary Mary is proud to present a solo exhibition by Ernst Caramelle. Presenting new work including a wall painting intervention, drawings, sun on paper and gesso pieces, the works draw attention to a practice, that begun in the 1960s, hints at the ambiguity within the concepts of presence, space and environment.

The categories of absence and presence, the change between different illusions and the focus on original and reproduction, negative and positive, rule and deviation, artist and viewer all form a central thread throughout his work. Caramelle focuses on the process that links the idea and the artistic product, and by using a distinctive language seeks to draw links to the space, object, image and concept that surround him.

Throughout Caramelle’s practice there is a constant exchange between these subjects, a return to and from the numerous, varying aspects of his oeuvre that reflect on the process of looking itself. All is rediscovered and shifted.

By means of his ‘spatial interventions,’ an economic hand is discovered. Produced within a simple process (watercolour is applied to the wall and repeatedly and partially rubbed away) and using the space and architecture as a raw material that is then restructured, these ‘frescoes’ seek to acknowledge a space as well as fade it out. Experiencing this work the initial space recedes, and yet by incorporating the window, door, alcove into the intervention, it is drawn back in.

However Caramelle now presents a new modified environment. A new place and perspective exists to confront its own disappearance and our role as the viewer within this. Caramelle acknowledges our experience of the work within the works themselves with a discreet gesture and language, whilst seeking to create something in the world that is non-definable and yet is ever present.

Born in Austria in 1952, Caramelle lives and works in Frankfurt, New York and Karlsruhe, where he teaches at the State Academy of Fine Arts, Recent exhibitions include a solo show at Galerie Im Taxispalais, Autriche (2008); ‘Ernst Caramelle, all printed matter 1974 - 2004,’ Museu de Arte Contemporanea de Serralves, Porto (2005); Galerie Nachst St. Stephan, Vienna (2006). Group exhibitions include ‘Occupying space,’ Sammlung Generali Foundation, Munich (2005); ‘The 80s: A Topology,’ Museu Serralves, Porto (2006).

A limited edition poster work will also be produced in conjunction with the exhibition.

Ernst Caramelle