Post-Everything Ritualism & Hypernaturality

© 2019 Peter Zahel
MEDIUM

Installation and Cocoa Ceremony

YEAR

2019

LOCATION

galerie GEDOK Munich

MATERIALS

mice bussard wings, blindworm, beetles, corn, branches, palo santo, moss, c-prints, ritual cutlery, drawings, video performance on tablet “Ritualistic Dialogue” 4:51 min, ceremonial cacao from Peru

No culture exists independently
without connection to other cultures.

© 2019 Peter Zahel

The artist's multicultural roots from Europe and Latin America inspired this installation. It is about her experiencing nature as a mystical place and being dependent on technology simultaneously.

© 2019 Peter Zahel

From the ceiling in the centre of the gallery hangs an uprooted plant. When someone opens the door to enter the space, the plant moves slightly. Dust and dead bugs seem to have fallen from it.

There is rainbow corn on the floor in the right corner. Next to it, on the wall, are two wings of a predator. On the windowsill, strange broken branches rest on a bed of moos. Opposite to the wings: another branch folded into a triangle.

Then three photographs of heavy green pine boughs. In the gallery's back passage are two display cases: on top of the first is a rainbow steel plate with a mummified blind-worm, a scissor, and a pink envelope with the written tag "tabaco". The other one shows the artist's catalogue magazine on top of palo santo sticks.

The installation closes with three plant drawings and the video "Ritualistic Dialogue", in which Veronika Dräxler and Max Fesl perform different sets of rituals.

The show was closed by the artist with a cocoa ceremonial circle.

FROM THE CATALOGUE

“If the ever-expansion of Technic´s productive chain is limited only by the obstacle of life, understood as problematic vulnerability, then it is also enhanced and made possible by this challenge. Within the limitless expansion that constitutes Technic’s very form of presence, life´s unbreakable resistance is resolved in the figure of an ever-receding horizon that the productive apparatus is made to chase endlessly. Every instance of the obstacle
is a problem that needs to be fixed, that is, it's a possibility for Technic´s further expansion”.

– Federico Campagna, Technic and Magic; Bloomsbury academic, London, 2018, 53 quoted in Renata Zas text “How to Make Sense of a Life Surrounded by Cognitive Mining?” in the catalogue-magazine published at the solo-show
© 2019 Peter Zahel
© 2019 Peter Zahel
© 2019 Peter Zahel
© 2019 Peter Zahel
© 2019 Peter Zahel
By clicking “Accept All Cookies”, you agree to the storing of cookies on your device to enhance site navigation, analyze site usage, and assist in our marketing efforts. View our Privacy Policy for more information.