We are delighted to present the third solo exhibition by Sebastian Utzni (born 1981 in Augsburg, Germany) at our gallery. Utzni is a conceptual artist who is equally at home in popular culture and the fine arts. He masters many artistic techniques employing them depending on the theme. In the current show, four groups of works in four different techniques introduce viewers to his visual and intellectual world.
The music is played by the, the mad men, is a line from the song Forever Young by the German band Alphaville from the 1980s. This song refers to the transience of life, fears of an atomic bomb being dropped during the Cold War, describes the fear of death and uncertainty, and at the same time expresses a longing for eternal youth and immortality. This range of emotions inspired Utzni to choose a passage from the song as the title for his exhibition.
In the first room, five woodcuts with stunning colour gradients and a black plan drawing printed on them greet the audience. This is the Architecture of Power series, which depicts floor plans of buildings of power around the globe: the White House, the Chinese government district, the Saudi royal palace, the seat of the Russian president and the seat of the European Commission. Architecture leads to reflect and reinforce power relations within a society. Monumental structures such as palaces, government buildings or religious sites not only serve functional purposes but are also expressions of political or social authority. The rainbow-like colour gradients in the background, which are based on the colours of flags of the states, dispel the authoritarian impression of the building floor plans and introduce a contemporary aesthetic reminiscent of queer flags and the Californian hippie era.
The work in the second room with the golden balloons is called 1789. The balloons are scattered randomly on the floor. Onto them Utzni has sprayed sentences from the Declaration of Human Rights, written on the occasion of the French Revolution. The sentences, which are still universal and form the basis of our civilisation, are present, but somehow also tired. The balloons have gone flat and are lying around as if after a party. Does their appearance figuratively indicate that human rights are at stake?
The 12-part series of paintings is called How to Survive the Apocalypse. It refers in a humorous, light-hearted way to the aesthetics of self-help guides and can be placed somewhere between an Instagram quote and the Fischli/Weiss work How to Work Better. Utzni researched what is recommended in the event of the end of the world and came up with a wide variety of often surprising answers. Here are some of the observations he put into pictures: In comics, the guys with the three-wheeled motorcycles always survive; a British study concludes that New Zealand is the safest place; and, of course, soap operas always know how to survive a new drama every day.
For the series of etchings called Ghosts, Utzni travelled throughout Europe to ‘collect’ words and wishes in cemeteries, which were then directly translated into etchings. The wishes beyond death, e.g. “rest” or ‘peace’, thus travel ghostly into the world of the living. One sees and feels the different stones, the textures, and perceives different typographical cultures. The connecting question is what we wish for beyond death and what we live every day.
Sebastian Utzni's artworks reflect our times of political brutalisation, major conflicts between superpowers and human insecurity. At the same time, Sebastian Utzni's works give the audience subtle instructions for action and appeal to common sense. He does this without ever being moralistic, but with a wink. His exhibition is a subtle chamber play of references and allusions in crazy times, in which reality seems to be replacing fictional drama.