Hannes Schmidt: State Of The Process

Opening reception on Saturday, 20 September, 7-9 pm

The show is an exploration of the “objecthood” of art works / under what conditions do objects become valorized, and under what conditions do they remain mere objects?/while suggesting that both the artist and the spectator are before an imminent reality that reveals itself in the process/time. Art as a field of experience in which the moment of transition becomes the interesting part- the moment when things collapse or vanish, is when their existence ceases to be gratuitous.

State of the process involves photographic documentation of collapsing objects, realized in its entirety at the gallery in Berlin as part of the artist's How long is long? series, copiously drawn patterns filling large pieces of paper, later to be completely erased, self-referential sculptures/photo stands and an artists' book.

The publication, that includes newspaper reports and reproductions of sculptures which were stolen to be melted and sold as pure material (an example being Rodin's Thinker) acts as a link between the base materials thrown and documented in the gallery space, the erased drawings and the photo stands whose equilibrium depends on the existence of the same objects, pictures of which they display.

Funny and sober, State of the process looks at presence through absence, the contingencies of cultural values and social realities and the still equivocal nature of the art object.

Hannes Schmidt (*1974, Freiburg) lives and works in Berlin. Recent exhibitions include Fresh Kills, Dumbo, Brooklyn, Eva’s Arche at GBE, New York, _Perhaps, Nice & Fit Showroom, Berlin, Panic Room: Works from the Dakis Joannou Collection, Deste Foundation, Athens.

Hannes Schmidt
State Of The Process