White Leather 02.06 - 17.07.2011
Dold Projects, St. Georgen
Biopolitics, 2011
shpants, hooks, silk screen on leather
Flat Idea With No Flesh, 2011
wood, wood sticker, silk screen on leather
A Head Gallery, 2011
wood, silk screen on leather
All Style No Content, 2011
mirror, silk screen on leather
mirror, silk screen on leather
Press Release
Imagine cutting an orange in half and finding both sides absolutely
disgusting. Whereas the material of white leather wouldn’t point to the
discount interior landscape of the higher Black Forest, it doesn’t even
point to the stripped skin of Saint Bartholomew. Skin is material and
material is flesh, as are references and authenticity and reality and
‘secrets’; elements constantly in use in contemporary culture
manufacture: platitude being the catalyst of inverse evolution. It is
only recently though that the stakes have got higher – where the bidding
match of manufacturers has got ever more sophisticated in surveying the
landscape, to refine their wares in all the more cunning ways. The
danger being, that anything that you ever valued in this world gets
sucked in the loop and what remains is a very fast rotating
unsentimental realism.
What if your father isn’t your father but your butcher’s father? The leathery skin of the butcher – his wide greasy hands touching his own face in the mirror. He can’t tell the difference between his clear reflection and the one smeared with lard as he slides himself upon all precious things with the same fingers. Would you put your secrets in these hands? Manuel Gnam tries hard.
When the ogival gothic arch curves to its apex, light on the right and darkness on the left, the blade formed by its point is the absolution that Manuel Gnam does not achieve.
What if your father isn’t your father but your butcher’s father? The leathery skin of the butcher – his wide greasy hands touching his own face in the mirror. He can’t tell the difference between his clear reflection and the one smeared with lard as he slides himself upon all precious things with the same fingers. Would you put your secrets in these hands? Manuel Gnam tries hard.
When the ogival gothic arch curves to its apex, light on the right and darkness on the left, the blade formed by its point is the absolution that Manuel Gnam does not achieve.