Black Forest

I embody Don Quixote set in the Black Forest. In the Black Forest there are no windmills and I have no desire to be charging at them. Neither am I the best poet ever seen…. In a historically and culturally sheltered area, I’m often seen as foreign, based on my artistic existence and my South American heritage. This sense of alienation and of being different has become part of my self-perception and is a gift at the same time. It allows me the freedom to examine motives from a fresh perspective and forge them in an unexpected manner.

“Black Forest” is a composition with traditional local origins. The installation consists of objects and templates made for the creation of brushes of all kinds. Wießler, a company from Todtnau ceased using their stock of templates made of wood and metal more than 10 Years ago. I managed to purchase some of these 200 year old objects. In each template is the writing of the owner engraved; secret codes which can only be interpreted by the owner and craftsmen themselves and in this regard may be seen as a metaphor for the anonymity of present day industry. However, once translated they explain the identification of the craftsmen with their work and their products.

In my opinion, these objects are surprisingly complex and well designed and yet were produced even under circumstances of poverty and icy weather. Archiving and combining the objects with modern ideas bring new perspectives to the table. For instance, the Codices from Todtnau are a prime example of historical preservation. This self-projection carries its own particular beauty which underlines the aesthetic composition of the objects.

I have entitled this installation ‘Eros’. The base of Eros is human life in its purest form. However, today the Eros human sheds tears. It’s natural for him to possess tears of disappointment, but in this day and age he cries perpetually. He cries over the influence of commerce, the corset of pornographic templates and the dispossession of the human body by multimedia.

The omnipresent marketing machine devours beastlike every human emotion and restricts every individual to their template, treating them as nothing more than goods. So in turn, Eros becomes just a product. The product becomes purchasable. Buying and selling is arbitrary. The remainders are eaten. The installation ‘Eros’ relates to this feast and its damage to the self-perception of the human.

The installation ‘Eros’ takes inventory: The template and the beast, its ravaged object and the destructive machine all align. From this operation stems a continuing tale of past efforts to establish self-definition on the one hand – and the loss of erotic humanity on the other. Don Quixote from the Black Forest.

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