Beginning: 18:00
Guided tour of the May exhibition with Mark Ther and curator Michal Jalůvka. The event will also include a catalogue launch.
Der Mai bringt Blumen dem Gesichte, aber dem Magen keine Früchte. (German proverb)
What is the meaning of a death that has managed to completely escape all attention? No funeral, no flowers or wake, but neither the long ringing of the doorbell, the horrified screams of the neighbour and the useless call for an ambulance. Some existences just seem to vanish from the world unnoticed, having long since disappeared from the minds of their surroundings. But appearances can be deceiving. Each person leaves behind a trail of footprints, and all that matters is at what stage of decay they greet the gaze of a possibly curious observer. Things. Personal belongings accumulated during life become the only reminder of the personality of the deceased. They are his defining characteristic. The kind of diary that can only be read when the last page fills with unfinished sentences and their meaning fades.
It is May, the garage door is ajar, letting in the fresh spring air while inviting an uninvited visitor onto the property. Just come in, he won't be angry.
If you really strain to enter the darkened mansion, you'll be drawn in. It will suck you in like a raspberry. Through the garage, past the top-of-the-range car, through the front garden and on down the hallway to the individual rooms. We find ourselves not only in a strange house, but also in a strange time in 1980s West Germany, among artifacts that were hard to find here at the time. The strange premonition of something sinister grows stronger with every door that is opened. Some might have preferred to return to the sunny spring street, but who were the right ones?"
Mark Ther once again plays with the past, this time closer in time to our present, but in some ways much more distant. While the authenticity of the objects on display is undeniably crucial, he does not attempt a faithful reconstruction. Through symbols and typical attributes, a certain form of period atmosphere is evoked, but this is soon shattered by blatant paradoxes and exaggerated clichés. The domestic idyll is also disrupted by a somewhat repulsive secret from an even more distant past, which spreads from the bedroom throughout the house and adds a sticky aftertaste to our exploration.
The connection between reality and fiction, appropriation and authorial creation, is made through the insertion of the author's drawings and prints into the family collection of the owner of the house alongside paintings and sculptures by long-forgotten artists. Even at this level, there is a sub-surface exchange of cultural references between the past and the present, driven more than anything else by an almost childishly sincere fascination.
The exhibition is one big set, the interior of a computer game or the backdrop of an immersive work, the traversal of which can also resemble something of an escape game. However, one can only escape from the artist's fantasies, childhood memories, and also from the inane games with our attention and perception of space through the magnificent anus of the ubiquitous cat Garfield.
In the person and work of Mark Thera, the well-known cliché about the inextricable union of life and art comes true. His work is largely characterised by outward appearances and a sincere, immediate interest in things. He works primarily with feature films, gallery installations and drawing. His way of working is characterized by a directorial approach, directing individual details and elements of meaning into a final whole. In this way, he creates plastic and (seemingly) authentic fictional worlds, within which he deals with themes related to the objects of his fascination. Whether it is the play with language, the fate of the Sudetenland and its inhabitants, queer themes or fashion. He often takes the aforementioned authenticity to a certain extreme, only to undermine it himself and give us a glimpse behind the scenes. In relation to Mark's vast body of work, a number of lines of interpretation could certainly be successfully developed towards his profound theoretical reflection. However, it could equally be said that the most interesting thing about Mark Ther is Mark Ther himself.
Curator of the exhibition: Michal Jalůvka
Price
Free entry
