20 Jun 2011

Kuenstlerhaus Schloss Balmoral opens a new space for contemporary art: Laden No 5

With the exhibition series carte blanche the Kuenstlerhaus Schloss Balmoral opens a new space for contemporary art, the Laden No 5. The first exhibition Mischa Kuball an Jan Hoeft und Jens Pecho opens at June 21st 2011 at 7.30 p.m.

The show is on display from June 22nd until August 14th 2011, open daily from 12 a.m. to 6 p.m. Visitor address: Laden No 5, Römerstraße 5, 56130 Bad Ems / Germany.


EXTENSION OF THE APPLICATION PERIOD FOR 2012 SCHOLARSHIPS

The application period for 2012 scholarships runs until July 15th 2011 (date of postmark). Available are six residence scholarships, one project scholarship, one curator scholarship and scholarships for artists who were born in, studied in, have lived or live in Rhineland-Palatinate. Please find here information and the relevant application forms: www.balmoral.de/english/balmoralscholarships/index.html


LADEN No 5: A NEW SPACE – A NEW CONCEPT

Kuenstlerhaus Schloss Balmoral opens a new space in the middle of Bad Ems. Laden No 5 refers to our first exhibition room, which was located exactly opposite in the colonnade and was demolished because of a historic restoration. Through Laden No 5 Balmoral will intensify the dialogue with the people and patients at the spas of Bad Ems as well as a wider audience with a new space for contemporary art.
In accordance with the principles of Balmoral, Laden No 5 will be a space for the free development of ideas. Renowned artists receive carte blanche with the mandate to invite young artists to exhibit in the space. As mentors, they programme and present the current exhibitions.
Through this intergenerational exhibition series we aim to promote young art and link the Balmoral scholarship holders closely with the art scene.
Thus the first carte blanche goes to Mischa Kuball, who as a juror co-selected the fellows currently living at Balmoral. For the opening exhibition of Laden No 5 he has chosen Jan Hoeft and Jens Pecho.

Dr. Danièle Perrier, Director, Kuenstlerhaus Schloss Balmoral


CARTE BLANCHE – A CLEAR STATEMENT

Jan Hoeft (born in 1981 in Blankenburg, studied at the Academy of Media Arts in Cologne and at the Academy of Fine Arts in Karlsruhe, Germany) and Jens Pecho (born 1978 in Frankfurt am Main, studied at the Art Academy of Media Arts in Cologne and at the Staedelschule in Frankfurt am Main) through their work they deal in different ways with the analysis of the surrounding cultural landscape.
While Hoeft's interests focus mainly on the field of architecture and the aesthetics of building materials, Pecho works primarily with the deconstruction of narrative structure in film, text and music. Both of their working methods link to an interest in questioning and destabilising constructions of truths.

Mischa Kuball, Professor of Media Arts, -1/minuseins experimental laboratory, Academy of Media Arts Cologne


TAKING OVER: JAN HOEFT AND JENS PECHO IN LADEN No 5

The first exhibition of the Carte Blanche series, which is also the opening exhibition of Laden No 5, shows new works by Jan Hoeft and Jens Pecho. In these works, the artists reflect on the specific situation of the space - a street level shop that is temporarily used as an exhibition space.
A guiding principle for both is the deconstruction of the exhibition space and a revaluation of its accessibility.
Jan Hoeft explores through his work Passage a radical reassessment of the physical exhibition space. Fitted precisely into the space, a tunnel-like path made of raw chipboard breaches the room and connects the orifices of the basic architectural structure. Jan Hoeft exalts the notion of the door as a thoroughfare as an absolute principle. The rest of the space, visible from the outside through the large windows is clearly declared as an exhibition area yet remains barricaded. Internal and external merge and the daily rhythm of the opening and closing of space is suspended.
Tunnels create new realities, a direct connection without any ifs and buts. It is the unambiguousness of the material chosen by Hoeft and the rigour of his intervention that question and re-determine the structure of the exhibition space. This intervention is subject to Hoeft's calculation and control and runs clear to one point.
At this point an indescribable soundtrack sets everything off where a multitude of information becomes nonsensical. In his latest work Jens Pecho has pressed on one vinyl disc all previously released albums of the 80s American trash metal band Overkill on top of each other. The result is the 16-fold exponential composition of fast and hard music like a carpet of noise, where at the end of each side of the record the longest pieces of music fray out.
Pecho works with the sound up to the limit of beat, density, and interference, while he restructures the lyrics of the songs in a printed format.
Overkill, the band's name, is used to describe a total acoustic experience. But the term also serves as historical reference to the arms race of the former superpowers during the Cold War, in this sense meaning the capacity for multiple nuclear annihilation of mankind.
Language and music are key elements in the work of Jens Pecho. Here, the artist uses found footage material, mainly music and film to expose specific cultural subtexts. The process of appropriation and reinterpretation forms a strategy to annul hierarchies and values; turning them upside down and rearranging these positions, in doing so deconstructing the relationship between text, music and image.
The third new work of the two artists in the exhibition in the Laden No 5 is a collaboration in printed form, which is displayed and can be taken away by the audience.

Kristina Kramer, curator-in-residency