Seidenpudelspitz - The Visual Art in Public Space

CYBEREmpathy ISSUE 4/2013. Contemporary Art in Public Space

Marika Wata, Seidenpudelspitz – The Visual Art in The Public Space

www.CyberEmpathy.com

Ika Wato, Lost nothing but color, print on banner, source: authors archive

Abstract:

Seidenpudelspitz is an international art project organized by the

association Sillixen AG in cooperation with the City of Bayreuth in

Germany on the occasion of 250th anniversary of the birth of Jean Paul

Friedrich Richter - one of the leading writers of German romanticism.

The project Seidenpudelspitz at Friedrichstrasse, (where the artist once

lived) in March 2013 was established over a dozen art installations

developed by an international group of artists.

MARIKA WATO

MARIKA WATO

SEIDENPUDELSPITZ - THE VISUAL ART IN THE PUBLIC SPACE

Bibliographic description to this article: 1. Seidenpudelspitz - The Visual Art in The Public Space/M. Wata. CyberEmpathy: Visual Communication and New Media in Art, Science, Humanities, Design and Technology. ISSUE 4 /2013. Visual Poodle. ISSN 2299-906X. Kokazone. Mode of access: Internet via World Wide Web




Seidenpudelspitz - The Visual Art in The Public

Space

Jean Paul Friedrich Richter is one of the leading German writers of

romanticism. For many years he lived on the street Friedrichstrasse in

Bayreuth. The historic buildings of the street have almost not changed at

all since Jaen Paul. It is on Friedrichstrasse situated now a monument

erected in honor of the writer in 1841, or 16 years after his death.

In 2013, the Seidenpudelspitz art project was realized at the urban space

of Friedrichstrasse. It was devoted to the work of Jean Paul Friedrich

Richter and developed by the local art association Sillixen AG.

The word "seidenpudelspitz" comes from the author's prose. The

exterior surfaces, the walls, the rooms in some buildings, courtyards and

gardens, located on the street were filled with the art installations have

been developed in the framework of the performance. Crossing the

street, following the successive points on the trail of the performance,

the recipient can experience a wide variety of aesthetic emotions.

Jean Paul's literary output was assumed to be the main source of

inspiration for the artists participating in the exhibition. The visual arts

have become the commentary on the literary works of Jean Paul

stimulating to a new life. They opened the new possibilities for

interpretation...




IKA WATO / Krakow

UTTA HAGEN / Duseldorf

KOMELIA HOFFMAN / Bremen




RUTH LOIBL / Rheinfelden

For the duration of the performance in cooperation with the City

Authorities the street of the Friedrichstrasse was closed to traffic,

transforming the exhibition space fully adapted to operate the public.

The urban space, which constitutes the context of the exhibition, was not

only the silent background for the presented installations. On the

contrary it entered into full interaction with the art.

Figure 3. Friedrichstrasse Bayreuth, source: commons.wikimedia.org

The exhibition was open to the public for two weekends, which

coincided with the birthday of Jean Paul. Transforming Friedrichstrasse

into the exhibition space spurred to life the entire local tourism

infrastructure. During the performance there were opened the

surrounding catering places where you can escape the crackling frost.

Despite the very low temperatures as for March, up to ten degrees below

zero, the show amassed a large audience that wanted to operate the

"visual secrets" of Friedrichstrasse prepared by

the Seidenpudelspitz project. The visitors were able to wander freely

back and forth, rediscovering the literary life of Jean Paul.




The Seidenpudelspitz project refers in its assumption to the theme

strongly linked with the regional culture. At the same time the jubilee

celebrations dedicated to the 250th anniversary of birth of the writer

were a pretext for the promotion of the contemporary art. This unique

combination of tradition and modernity is the greatest asset of

the Seidenpudelspitz, showing its artistic potential and generating the

interest both of the artists and the visitors around the project.

The very title of the Seidenpudelspitz 1 project is rather torn out of the

context element that can be interpreted in any way. Thanks to this it

intrigues and compels the viewer to search for the intellectual context of

the event.

The use of the modern visual arts to transform the spatial tissue of

Friedrichstrasse into the space for the presentation of art inspired by the

works of Jean Paul is the interference not only into the urban structure

of the city (the street was free of traffic for four days, and thus there was

changed the basic function of the street - from the communication to the

performance). The strength of the artistic impact of

the Seidenpudelspitz project consists primarily of its intervention into

the social structure of Friedrichstrasse. For four days this, known on the

local scale, the average part of the city becomes in fact the intriguing

cultural epicenter completely open to the public. Peter Shmid

writes: The architecture should be understood in the broadest sense of

the term, as an integral part of shaping the civilization and

1 Roughly translated (in German): "seiden" - silk, "pudel" - poodle (dog breed), "Spitz" – spike




culture 2.The Seidenpudelspitz project is entered fully into this idea of

the “socially responsible architecture” thanks to the special artistic

intervention that has taken the place.

An additional advantage of the project is its interactivity. The

arrangement of the art objects over the whole street makes them become

the space for the personal travel and free exploitation. The creation of

the visual arts festival events combined with culinary attractions revives

the entire local infrastructure, increasing the attractiveness of the

"cultural travel" along Friedrichstrasse. In this way the modern art

enters into a dialogue with the elements of the public space and the

historic architecture of the street casually, so to say. The clash of all the

separate qualities within the space well-known to the local residents by

daily use sharpens the senses of the visitors, resulting in an entirely new

spatial perception.

Walking down the street we look and observe; the street is stored in us

as the interpretation of our environment, it remains in our memory.

This ability of the automatic unconscious organizing the space allows

finding ourselves intuitively in the environment, discovering the places

for the shelter and rest 3.The mechanism of the interference in the

urban and social structure used in the Seidenpudelspitz makes this

project not only a "cultural product", but also "the culture-creating

product" with a real impact on the development of the local cultural

identity among the local residents.

The exhibition was attended by fifteen artists - Germans and foreigners

were invited to participate in the exhibition. The selection of the artists

and the invitation rested entirely on the shoulders of the association

Sillixen AG.

The artists had the complete freedom in choosing the means of art. The

interpretation of the artistic works of Jean Paul was dependent only on

the imagination and sensitivity of the invited artists.

The artists, who have participated in the exhibition:

2 Housing: Building Homes - A "CyberEmpathic 'Process Part 1 - The Model / P. Schmid. CyberEmpathy: Visual Communication and New Media in Art, Science, Humanities, Design and Technology ISSUE 2/2012. CyberSky. ISSN 2299-906X. Kokazone . Mode of access: Internet via World Wide Web. URL: http://www.cyberempathy.com/ #! issue2article4/c1hf8 [Architecture Should be seen in its broadest meaning. It is what humankind is building as civilization and culture.] 3 A. Głowacki, From empathy to cyberspace. On visual communication in public space, 1st Edition, p.h. Academic Consortium. Publisher EEZ in Krakow, UiTM in Rzeszow, WSZiA in Zamosc, 2012, p. 164




The German artists:

Martin Fürbringer – Germany

Utta Hagen – Germany

Cornelia Hoffmann – Germany

Patricia Lambertus – Germany

Ruth Loibl – Germany

Philipp Moll – Germany

Christian Psyk – Germany

Robert Siebenhaar – Germany

Heidrun Schimmel – Germany

Andrea Sohler – Germany

Annette Voigt – Germany

Christa Varadi – Germany

Reiner Zitta – Germany

The foreign artists:

Sam Hopkins – Kenya

Ika Wato – Poland

The main organizer of the project, the Association Sillixen e.V. 4, exists

in Bayreuth since 2006 and operates as a non-profit organization. The

association consists of four people: Achim Eichholz, Werner Geister,

Christa Pawlofsky and Johann Schuierer. All are active in the field of the

visual arts, primarily as artists and, thanks to their association, as

promoters of the artistic events.

The main activities of the society revolve around the organization of

projects in the public space. The Association Sillixen AG has realized so

far four such projects with the aim of stimulating art to life by placing it

in the context of everyday human activity with unconventional

exhibition ideas.

„Sonntagsauslfug”

„Parallelaktion”

„Glühwürmchen – Feuersalamander”

„… no Center”

4 e.V. (eingetragener Verein) - registered association, the legal form of the organization with legal personality in Germany and Austria, which are voluntary association of private persons appointed to the joint protection of their rights, registered in the German (and Austrian) court register of associations




The members of Silixen AG look for the new ways of art presenting and

the ways of communication between art and recipient, far from the

traditional exhibition, which can be seen in the museums. The artist

activity is settled by them in the context of public space, so that the

cultural transmission is likely to reach a larger number of people, even

those not yet interested in the visual arts, and to make the real influence

on shaping public awareness and sensitivity within the artistic

community of Bayreuth.

Documents

Seidenpudelspitz - The Visual Art in Public Space