Faced with big-format paintings right at both sides of the entrance all the while featuring an installation in the middle of the room, ‘Corporal Temperature’ builds tension with the viewer as soon as one enters the space. The exhibition curated in parts but also as a whole, gives unique intimate glimpses into the different sections where different artists are exhibiting their work while putting the artistic puzzle together. Upon entering it is clear that one can navigate to the left or the right and around the middle; this dynamic is built by the fluency and yet heterogeneity of the space which invites the visitor to move freely and inspect the rooms in their multi-faceted industrial landscape.
‘Corporal’, an ironic approach to the title, a word obviously playing between ‘corporeal’ and ‘corporal’ is there to refer both to the ‘warmth’ of the artworks and yet to the ‘structure’ which the space impels on them. Meanwhile, the word ‘temperature’ calls for our attention to the number 36 – naturally the rough temperature of the human body, but also the literal number of the round of international residents at Pilotenkueche Art Program. 36 degrees, which keep us alive, and allow us to function as biological entities, combine here with the ‘cold’ concrete and the rough surroundings to provide an allegory for the body itself. The notion of the body, as a multi-faceted and yet natural creation with its own rules and functions, come here into a conceptual interplay with the space, as a human construction, subject to change and adjustments to the needs of its inhabitants / users. One soon realises that the two notions, of harmony and industry come into dialogue and interfere with each other on a meta-level of an emotional experience that is reflected by the exhibition and the works which comprise it.
Some artworks tell more than one stories at the same time or are done during the same period with totally different inspiration sources. Some works comprise in their core by a performance, bringing into play different media; different voices frame the content of ‘Corporal Temperature’ spreading out the artistic creation across 465 sqm with each one of them occupying a large space. As one might notice, there is space to breathe between the walls which have been moved to support the concept solidification. The back rooms of the space have been used as single showrooms, occupied by one artist each, therefore, to provide a balanced outcome to the aisles that propose boundaries between the two sides of the space which contain a large part of the artistic works on display. Either corporal or corporeal, the exhibition is there to create a sense of flow, avoiding hierarchical or other political statements by providing the visitor with the space and architecture to navigate and better understand each artwork as well as the relation –if any- to one another.
Artists: International residents: Ando Saori (Performance, Choreography, Video; Osaka, Japan / Bielefeld, Germany) Arabella Hilfiker (Painting, Printmaking, Book Art; Cambridge, UK) Chelsea Markuson (Installation, Drawing, Performance; East Lansing, Michigan, USA) Curtis Welteroth (Installation, Painting; Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA) Jing Tan (Sculpture, Performance; China/London, UK) Lily Cummins (Drawing, Installation; Darlinghurst, Australia) Nathan Jay Brooker (Painting; Perth, Australia) Simona Reisch (Photography ; Vienna, Austria) Local Participants Beate Körner (Performance, Conceptual; Leipzig, Germany) Undine Bandelin (Painting; Leipzig, Germany)