Brick by Brick

1977 - now, Steeg, Tyrol

For the last 20 years I have been working in and with the unfinished house in the small Tyrolean village I grew up called Steeg. It provides me not only a physical but also a mental space to examine my interests and concerns.

Construction plan‭ - ‬1977‭. ‬1977‭, ‬print and stamps‭, ‬35‭ ‬x 82‭ ‬cm

The notion of reconsidering the permanence and temporality in male-dominated architecture intrigues me. I understand this project as an investigation into space, a restructuring of space as a process that has a fluid relationship with the outcome. My work questions space and its ephemeral structure, its openness and suitability to play with the imagination. It is this character of space that leaves it susceptible to a reshaping through performative acts of the white, eurocentric, heteronormative reality framed by a capitalist belief system.

The unfinished yet desolate house is a monument, or is it a memorial? to the unfulfilled ideal of patriarchal family conventions. Performing normative gender roles in the home construct the patriarchal reality I experienced in this valley. Disassembling and reassembling the house/home/architecture is ultimately a performative act that will construct its own reality.

SPITZE & Somebody’s Always Watching! 2017, installation view, Mediterranea 18, Young Artists Biennale, Tirana

Somebody's Always Watching! 2014, HD, 2 min 27, color, sound

The video shows my body performing the rooms that make up the house. These acts seek to understand the space, and the objects contained within, challenging the social conventions of the home. I examine objects tools confined to their own contexts, their histories and their subsequent meanings. Our understanding of the world is defined by the things with which we are surrounded. A belief system is inscribed by the connection between language and objects. The tools we use not only quietly and dutifully accomplish their work, but in doing so bring out the feeling and spirit embedded in the phenomenal earth.

SPITZE! 2014, 18 m x 50 cm, 12mm polypropylene rope, stainless steel rod. Supported by: Land Tirol

I crocheted a lace trim made of 12mm white polypropylene rope around the balcony of the house, titled "SPITZE" (Spitze means in German "great" but also "lace"). The lace refers to women's craft in this region. What is usually inside meticulously tidy homes and churches, is now outside and comments on the disturbance of the picturesque landscape of the town and tourist expectations.

Brick #02, Brick #03, Brick #04, Brick #05, Brick #06 traced and ready for Transformation, 2020, Frottage, graphite on tissue paper, each 150 x 110 cm, folded, artist’s frame, beech wood, each 42 x 31 x 2.5 cm, © 2021 Bildrecht, Wien. Photo: Günter Kresser

Portrait of Brick #02, #03, #04, #05 and #06. 2020, digital print, dimensions variable

Possibility #01. Just the way they are. 2020, digital rendering

Possibility #02. All full and tense. 2020, digital rendering

Possibility #03. Archeological Approach. Down the marmot hole. 2020, digital rendering

Bernhard. 2019 - ongoing, HD, b&w, sound, loop, 2 h 29 min

Statement about Height, Depth and Circumstance. 2013, HD, 11 min, color, sound

In the attic, well protected under the roof. The strange must arise from the circumstances.On and on, on and on!