Traces

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was a site specific pop-up show in a former Railroad Station in rural New York. It was one of the oldest in the country and had initially been used for freight, but later for passenger transportation as well. This abandoned space, which had been slowly and carefully refurbished by its owner, left a huge impression on me when first seen. I was so inspired by its marks, which obviously, but obscurely, indicated its historical depth.

My artwork is concerned with establishing connections and here I was confronted with a SPACE, the only purpose of which had formerly been to connect: places, cultures and people.

I was fascinated by how the space’s elusive nature stood in contradiction to the density of carried memory. It struck me how many opposing individual thoughts and feelings may have been emitted by millions of people from different cultures and times passing through. Big dreams, hopes, anxiety, stress, boredom, anticipation, anger, love, longing.

A collective energy, stored and built up over the years, not discarded, nor forgotten, by the building.

I was on a mission to follow those traces, to become playful with the marks and indications that this place was generously offering me. I wanted to read them and let them inspire me to add to the story it was telling.

I integrated objects, that had been found on site into my whole installation concept and enhanced certain marks, that otherwise may have stayed unnoticed by the visitors.

The opening turned out to be a bit like a "treasure hunt", the playfulness and excitement I had felt during the installation process, was transferred to the viewers.

In my Floor installation, responding to peculiar holes drilled into the wooden planks, I played on this thought of captured and reoccurring collective energy streams with my series of fictitious liquid circulation systems made from tubes and found objects.