Leon Hösl will be speaking about the exhibition

There is one element in Hanakam & Schuller's repertoire that has been recurring for years and yet continues to surprise me: derivatives of everyday consumption, containers and closures made of plastic in a wide variety of shapes and colours, all based on the same system. Like the sentence building blocks of a chatbot, the individual parts can be linked together almost at random. Meanwhile, there is a seemingly endless series of these enigmatic artifacts (SPEICHER (2022)), which result in a characteristic system of forms that can never be deciphered and thus become their very own language. These elements appear in almost every work by Hanakam & Schuller and are used as a kind of pawn in films, intertwine into grotesques, or are presented gloved, like a shrine. In a new series (PROFILE (2022)), the objects additionally appear as prints on the gloves—a confusing doubling: the glove serves to hold—thus show—the object and its surface becomes an image of the same. The aura around these plastic objects is growing; one could almost speak of a cult that is forming around them. And this impression is not accidental, because the dynamics in the interplay of language, gesture, architecture, materiality and form in the creation of an aesthetic of uniqueness is at the same time a readily used technique as well as a favourite field of investigation for Hanakam & Schuller. This field includes the long history of landscape viewing and idealisation of nature as well as International Style architecture, emblematics, or textual forms of Mannerism.

Often language and text sources are at the very beginning of their working process. This was also the case with the 2-channel installation THE MOIST CABINET (2021), for the creation of which we worked closely together last year. Two stanzas from William Shakespeare's VENUS AND ADONIS (1593) and Bettina von Arnim's poem AN PAMPHILIO (19th century) determined the direction for the video work and can now be heard alternately and overlapping in the respective original language as voice-over.

Both texts use descriptions of nature in their imagery, which point to very different attitudes of the authors; in Shakespeare, nature serves as a catalyst of sexual desire; in Arnim, the physical experience of nature triggers the need for its preservation. On the one hand, 'And calls it heavenly moisture, air of grace, / Wishing her cheeks were gardens full of flowers / So they were dew'd with such distilling showers.' And on the other, 'Thy silence, nature, do not break. / Not on rustling leaf / With stylus wake thee.' The text material drew the eye to the Black Forest in southwestern Germany—a region known for its qualities as a natural water reservoir—so valuable especially today, and therefore a popular setting for air cures. This became the film's production location.

The dining room of a sanatorium in St. Blasien, one of the most famous climatic health resorts, became the central filming location. A magnificent hall completely lined with marble, the walls decorated with paintings by Adolf Hildenbrand dedicated to the elements. Nature divided into earth, water, air and fire. An air chamber in the shape of a giant peanut glides through the hall. It encloses the air, places it in space and presents it so that one is again reminded of Shakespeare: 'air of grace'.

While in THE MOIST CABINET, the influence of language on man's understanding of nature is revealed, it seems to me that FIREPLACE (2022) reverses this relationship. The fire, hemmed in by a hearth of ancient reliefs on which we re-encounter familiar artifacts, speaks to us in a way that instills self-awareness, purposefulness, and mindfulness. Motivational advice texts and firesides: an almost unbeatable combination. The three most successful YouTube fireplace videos have 170 million clicks. And behind the talking flames are the words of Robert H. Schuller (1926-2015), televangelist, best-selling author and founder of the gigantic Crystal Cathedral in Los Angeles. The flickering of the flames, the affirmation 'If you can dream it, you can do it' and the subversive effect is not long in coming: the pulse slows down, self-confidence increases, focus sharpens. Language shapes our view and influences our relationship to the environment, but it also manages to transform self-perception from one moment to the next—abracadabra!

Leon Hösl

Markus Hanakam was born in 1979 in Essen, West Germany, lives and works in Vienna.Roswitha Schuller was born in 1984 in Friesach, Austria, lives and works in Vienna.Both attended the class for art and design from 2002-2007 and the class for sculpture from 2006-2009 at the University of Applied Arts Vienna,Roswitha Schuller received her Ph.D. in sociology of art and culture in 2012.The artists have been working together since 2004.

Selection of solo shows: Hanakam & Schuller x Current Interests, MAK Center for Art and Architecture Los Angeles (US), 2022, Builders & Widgets, Maison Cattin, Voegtlinshoffen (FR), 2021, Hanakam & Schuller, Krinzinger Projekte, Vienna (A), 2021, The Emblematic Cabinet, Galerie im Traklhaus, Salzburg (A), 2020, The Emblematic Cabinet, Städtische Galerie Cham im Cordonhaus, Cham (DE), 2020, OIKOS, ART BOX im Museumsquartier, Vienna (A), 2020, Linterna Magica, Ebensperger Rhomberg x Berlinale Forum Expanded, Berlin (DE), 2020, Heralds & Enblems, Museo Lapidarium, Novigrad/Cittanova (HR), 2019, The Heralds, HilbertRaum Berlin (DE), 2018, Mobile, Galerie Krinzinger (A), 2017, Die Acht Schätze, Neuer Kunstverein Wien (A), 2016, Cosmic Cathedral, Galerie Krinzinger, Vienna (A), 2016, Phantom und Travertin (mit Janek Rous), Austrian Cultural Forum, Prague (CZ), 2015, Crystal Cathedral, Museum Moderner Kunst Kärnten, Klagenfurt (A), 2012, Palaces & Courts, MAK Österr. Museum für angewandte Kunst/Gegenwartskunst, Vienna (A), 2010, Road Movie, Kunsthalle Wien Ursula Blickle Lounge (A), 2009

Selection of group shows: Biennale für Freiburg, Freiburg im Breisgau (GER), 2021, Kulturforum-Berlin (GER), 2021, Onassis Foundation, Athens (GR), 2021, Contemporary Art Initiative, Piraeus (GR, online), 2021, Kunstverein Kärnten, Klagenfurt (A) 2020, Anthropocene On Hold, PCAI Polyeco Contemporary Art Initiative, Piraeus (GR) 2020 (online), Mind so Fast, Body so Slow, Berlin Weekly, Berlin (DE) 2020, House of Rituals, Vienna Art Week, Vienna (A) 2020, Rencontres Internationales, Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin (DE) 2020, Rencontres Internationales, Contemporary Moving Images, Louvre Auditorium, Paris (FR) 2020, Contemporary Moving Images, Paris (FR), 2019, Museum Villa Stuck, Munich (DE), 2018. This year their work will be on view at the Freiburg Biennial in Freiburg in Breisgau (DE).

Press release courtesy Galerie Krinzinger. Text: Leon Hösl.