Meina Schellander
METAGRASS. REFRACTIONS. A Selection of Works 1986–2016
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© Heribert Corn
“I’m a worker, a merchant practically without a market, a lone wolf, they say,” wrote Meina Schellander in 1990. For the first time, Meina Schellander is presenting her work in a large solo exhibition at the Galerie Freihausgasse, a selection of works from 1986 to the present: EPSILON, OMIKRON, LAMBDA, black, sign-like, defiant figures take up position. The variable OPEN FIGURE extends right across the room in the work “StandzuWendeZustand” (“fromStateToTransformationState”). T standing upside down, piercing space. DAMPERS rolling. GRASS, just grass, making intrusions, INNER FREQUENCIES etc. directing thought and action. Irritation, balance. Behind it all? HEMMA 1988, awakened, occupying the underground space.” Meina Schellander, Vienna, March 2015
“Meina Schellander is an exceptional figure. For decades she has been creating works that are always new and, from the formal poit of view, often differ unexpectedly and abruptly from what has gone before, works, however, that can only be understood in connection with other, even much earlier works. She is a perfectionist, which is why we often have to wait forever for the realization and completion of many groups of works. She is not one to compromise. She sees the impressive aesthetic force of her work as only one of its aspects, a secondary phenomenon behind which the essence lies concealed. Her refusal to accept half measures and her aversion to making artistic concessions are deeply rooted in her character. Specific ideas and specific form are of course central here, but of even greater importance is an attitude, one that is rarely exemplified by other artist personalities.” Thomas Zaunschirm, from the monograph: Meina Schellander, Kopf und QUER, Ritter Verlag, 1998
1946 Born in Klagenfurt 1966 Completed secondary education at the BLnBA in Klagenfurt 1966 – 1970 Academy of Fine Arts Vienna, Meisterschule für Grafik with Prof. M. Melcher; diploma: Mag. art 1978 Birth of daughter Natalie Since 1968 Exhibitions and participation in exhibitions both in Austria and abroad. Areas of work: drawing, photography, object art, sculpture, room installation, video, art in public space. Member: Kunstverein Kärnten, Secession, IntAkt, GAV, [kunstwerk] krastal. Works are included both in Austrian and in foreign collections. Lives and works as an independent artist primarily in Vienna and occasionally in Carinthia. Curated the KRASTAL-PROJEKT 2010–2014 (with Sibylle von Halem, [kunstwerk] krastal).
“[...] Meina Schellander, an exceptional artist and a “Bauerin”* (as she has labeled herself), working in an intermediate zone between language art, image art, object art and performance art, herself from a Southern Carinthian seamstress family, she not only uses ropes to create installations that span space, attaching erratic rocks, roofs of houses as well as façades and interiors of churches, artistically threading things together, as it were, binding them in new bonds, but also, in her various AEIOU series from the earliest period of her creative activity, she has lovingly devoted her attention to individual vowels, and, as if embossing paper were not a discreet enough treatment already, in something of a further challenge to the viewer’s searching eye, she has sewn the embossments in – again threading – behind a variety of crisscross networks of taut twine, which, in their appealing dynamics, cause our gaze to overshoot the edges of each picture, but at the same time keep escorting it back in, an oscillating vowel-meditation that takes place entirely within each person’s inner world through the medium of vectorially sewn-in rectangular surfaces, 5 rectangular surfaces whose very number, however, seems to indicate that thought has been given to a completeness of the voice’s resonant universe due to the magic of these letters, or, as Meret Oppenheim, in exactly the same vein, warns us in rhymes: “Von Beeren nährt man sich / Mit dem Schuh verehrt man sich / Husch, husch, der schönste Vokal entleert sich.” (“One feeds on berries / One salutes with the shoe / Quick, quick, the most beautiful vowel empties itself.”)” * From the German verb “bauen” = to build, construct (Translator’s Note)
Bodo Hell, from: ”AEIOU, zu Meina Schellanders 5-er-Serien”, 2013
STOPPELFELD (Zeit-Land-Anteil) / INNERE FREQUENZ 21, STUBBLE FIELD (Time-Land-Slice) / INNER FREQUENCY 21, 2001/02, drawing on paper and B/W photograph on baryta/PVC/acrylic glass, engraving, spacer frame, acrylic glass covering, 131.8 x 71.8 cm
MAIS (Zeit-Land-Anteil) / INNERE FREQUENZ 97, MAIZE (Time-Land-Slice) / INNER FREQUENCY 97, 2003/05 Drawing on paper and B/W photograph on baryta/aluminum, acrylic glass covering, 131 x 71 x 6.6 cm
... to look deeply into photographs of portions of thickly grown natural systems, to make visible in layers of color drawn on sized paper – in the INNER FREQUENCIES – successively a balance, a contrast, or a parallel space that raises questions; to delve into natural environments from which one feels a sense of distance at first, to filter them, to add to them until, sometimes, in the drawings, a parallel, inner world emerges. Processes that are exciting and joyous. (M. Sch. 2014/16)
AEIOU 9/10, 2010/13, 5 embossments on Hahnemühle copperplate paper, 350 g, with networks of taut twine, 40 x 30 cm each
GRAS (Zeit-Land-Anteil) / INNERE FREQUENZ 75, GRASS (Time-Land-Slice) / INNER FREQUENCY 75, 2003/04 Drawing and color photograph on paper/aluminum, acrylic glass covering, 191 x 111 x 6.6 cm On loan from a private collection, Klagenfurt
GRAS (Zeit-Land-Anteil) / INNERE FREQUENZ 209, GRASS (Time-Land-Slice) / INNER FREQUENCY 209, 2003/15 Drawing and color photograph on paper/aluminum, acrylic glass covering, 131 x 71 x 6.6 cm GRAS (Zeit-Land-Anteil)/ INNERE FREQUENZ 214, 215 GRASS (Time-Land-Slice) / INNER FREQUENCY 214, 215, 2003/15, drawing and B/W photograph on baryta/aluminum, acrylic glass covering, 111 x 91 x 6,6 cm each
Beginning in 2002, Meina Schellander juxtaposes photographs in the series ZEIT-LAND-ANTEIL (Time-Land-Slice) and drawings, the INNER FREQUENCIES. Details of stubble fields, tree trunks (beginning in 2001/02) and fields planted with grain, such as maize, wheat, rye, oats (beginning in 2002/03), are the photo subjects; drawings in pencil, colored pencil and crayon define reduced, linear structures and more condensed correlations – a mixed relationship between inside and outside, between the grown and the constructed. In each pair done by the artist, a nearly monochrome photograph of thickly grown portions of nature gives a sense of congestion within, elements of which constitute the drawing, materializing in mixtures of broken colors. To react to nature and immediately to construct – this is the strategy behind this pictorial series of the past few years. (M. Sch. 2002/12)
HAFER und – (Zeit-Land-Anteil) / INNERE FREQUENZ 170, OATS and – (Time-Land-Slice) / INNER FREQUENCY 170, 2003/08 Drawing and color photograph on paper/aluminum, acrylic glass covering, 111 x 191 x 6.6 cm On loan from the Villach municipal collection
COMPOSITE ELEMENT 12 and 13, 2014, Diasecs, each measuring 100 x 100 cm and in a limited edition of 4 copies
COMPOSITE ELEMENTS, work in progress, begun in 2009 Since the 1970s, I have been incorporating nature into my creative thinking as elemental force made visible, as a seemingly inexhaustible source of energy, but also as a system that is vulnerable. Depending on the phase I am in and on my thematic orientation, I supplement portions of nature with my Inner Frequencies, or I layer them, I combine them digitally with photo details from various works dating from earlier periods of my creative activity, and I transform these connections into new, pictorial works that have a formulistic character. Alongside the two more recent works from the series COMPOSITE ELEMENTS, both Diasec prints in the format 100 x 100 cm, I produced, in 2014, a 10-part print series, FOTOGRAFIK (“Photo Graphics”, 9 digital photo collages from the series COMPOSITE ELEMENTS, 2009-2014, and FELDSTRATEGIE (“Field Strategy”) 1, 2011) in limited editions of 4 – 8 copies, done as pigment prints on Tecco Photo Baryt Glossy paper 300 g, in the uniform format 40 x 30 cm.” (M. Sch. 2010/14/16)
STAMM (Zeit-Land-Anteil) / INNERE FREQUENZ 182, TREE TRUNK (Time-Land-Slice) / INNER FREQUENCY 182, 2003/10 Drawing on paper and B/W photograph on baryta/aluminum, acrylic glass covering 131 x 71 x 6.6 cm On loan from the Hans Schmid Private Foundation
HEMMA OF GURK, 1988 (model) Room installation with sitting figure, arc of offerings (10 objects) and 2 lateral picture/pole supplements; overall dimensions: 230 x 770 x 750 cm; joint exhibition with Kiki Kogelnik, Schloss Strassburg, Carinthia, within the framework of the 1988 Hemma Jubilee celebrations. The parts making up the installation were restored in 2015/16; some elements were modified and adapted for the exhibition at the Galerie Freihausgasse. HEMMA OF GURK (c. 990 – c.1045), Carinthian noblewoman, founder of churches and abbeys, is venerated in the Roman Catholic Church as a saint and is the patroness of Carinthia. Since 1174, she has lain buried in the crypt of the cathedral church of Gurk. Filled with the love of God and mankind, Hemma chose to live a life of responsibility; she strove to come to grips with each challenge posed by the real world in order to achieve transcendence. Hemma, a person of maturing, human dimensions, not a figure of supernatural fascination, became an identification figure for me because of her constant struggle for life and her dynamism. Hemma – not a legend, but a stimulus to generate new movement.
About the room installation: The central Hemma figure (330 x 360 x 220, plaster, polystyrene, wood, aluminum) is made up of approximately 20 components: body coil, 5 loose leaning objects, base arc, central rod/vertical center/construction with 2 imaginary compasses, disc, sphere/body of the head, 2 projecting arms/eyes with comb, 2 conical pins, head wave, final piece. In the foreground of the space occupied by the sitting figure hangs the arc of offerings with 10 offerings (wooden objects/released energies). Two paintings flank the central figure. The red painting (120 x 120 cm, acrylic on canvas) shows an energetically structured, imaginary head; in the blue painting (500 x 100 cm, acrylic on canvas), it is especially the visionary aspect of interpreting Hemma that is given expression; nothing here seems to hinder the spiral’s upward climb into infinity. The picture/pole supplements that could be seen in the first version are not present in the room installation adapted for the exhibition in the Galerie Freihausgasse. They represented a spatial barrier, which raised further questions, questions that went beyond the Hemma project – art and the Church, art and the public – questions today as well? It would still be a good idea to transfer the Hemma model to bronze, stone or cast stone and to adapt the installation for public space. (Meina Schellander, taken partly from the catalog of the Hemma Jubiläum exhibition, 1988, Schloss Strassburg, Carinthia, and from Meina Schellander’s monograph Kopf und QUER, published by Ritter Verlag, Klagenfurt, 1998)
FIGUR MY, FIGURE MU , 1996, 5-piece edition, aluminum, Myren, neon, 83-134 x 60 x 60 cm
4 projected figures from the series FIGUR/RAUM (“Figure/Space”), named after the symbols of the Greek alphabet, such as the figures Epsilon, Omikron, Lambda and Tau. After an interruption that lasted many years, the series is presently being completed. FIGUR EPSILON, FIGURE EPSILON, 1991/2016 Wood, acrylic glass, aluminum, tool steel, black acrylic lacquer, 215 x 60 x 67 cm
FIGUR ALPHA, FIGURE ALPHA, 1990, 12-piece edition, wood, steel, dispersion paint, wax, 24 x 67 x 55 cm
standzuwendezustand, fromStateToTransformationState, 2010, exhibition in the Jesuitenfoyer, Vienna, comprising Open Figure, T-object with drawing, video and space divider OFFENE FIGUR, OPEN FIGURE, 2010 (after a concept from the year 1993) stainless steel, plastic, 210.5 x 596 x 40-407 cm The prototype is not for sale. Can be ordered in small edition.
Thoughts about standing, withstanding, being unable, capacitating, coming about, but also about a change of condition, a transformation, a turn of phrase or turning to.
Systemzeichnung KERNFIGUR, System drawing BASIC FIGURE, 1993/2010 The Open Figure comprises a basic figure, an expansive figure and a defensive figure. It consists of a 9-piece base pipe, D = 7 cm: 7 base-pipe elements measuring 80 cm each in length, and two end pieces, 18.2 cm each in length, all of which lie supported at a slight distance from the ground. Attached to the base-pipe elements are 7 unscrewable pipe arms, whose direction is variable, each measuring 200 cm in length, D = 4.8 cm. The internal structure consists of a central pipe and a number of supporting blocks made of tool steel and plastic. T, 2006, stainless steel, prototype, 560 x 330 cm
The T, as a symbol for time, is upside down and leaning against the wall to simulate the mobility of the factor time, inherent in which is not only continuity, but also and especially the constant will to change in order to continuously renew oneself and not to stagnate. Supplemented by the action video “t-verbindlich” (“t-connected”), 2006, 14:40, DVD. RAUMTEILER 2, SPACE DIVIDER 2, 2009, 2 views of a forest, each divided in two, hanging in the room as a curtain, digital print on voile, 4 parts, 353 x 160 cm each 4 Teile à 353 x 160 cm
DÄMPFER, DAMPER, 2001 Stainless steel, rubber, aluminum, 220 x 80 x 18 cm
Mobile T-construction for dampening the intensity of a highly charged room constellation
DICHTE LICHTE / LICHTE DICHTE 3, DENSE CLEARANCE / CLEAR DENSITY 3, 2011 Work in progress, begun in 2010; a series of 10 wall objects is planned. Birch plywood, strips of wood, digital printing on voile, acrylic glass, twine, nails, dispersion paint, colored pencil, 37.4 x 33 x 47.4 cm each
In these objects, the ”forest“, as a theme, will be densified, cleared and developed.
KOPFERGÄNZUNG H: TRANSIT, ADDITION TO THE HEAD H: TRANSIT, 2016 Slate erratic rock, stainless steel construction, rubber, sandblasted glass, 124 x 70 x 32 cm
remrec_or 45-, 42/150, 2013/15/16, work in progress, begun in 2013, 150 pieces planned. Original collages, excerpts from etchings and paper embossments done by the artist from 1967 on, crisscrossed with twine, mounted inside passe-partout boards, also crisscrossed with twine, 24 x 30 cm each
Kopfergänzungen A-Z, (Additions to the Head A-Z), are based on the zero marker “Findling Krastal” (Krastal erratic rock), and constitute, since 1973, a series of “inner formulas”, which do not result from any formal, physical laws, but, rather, settle periodically as deposits, as remains that can no longer be modified. Each “Addition to the Head” defines a time segment. Sometimes the formulas mesh or overlap. All products meant for the world at large are reliant on certain “Addition to the Head”. 8 “Addition to the Head” have been created so far.
Cover: Meina Schellander, GRASS (Time-Land-Slice) / INNER FREQUENCY 213, 2003/15, drawing and B/W photograph on baryta/aluminum, acrylic glass covering, 110 x 90 cm. Concept, photos, texts if not otherwise mentioned M. Schellander © Bildrecht, Wien. Texts © the authors
Galerie Freihausgasse · Galerie der Stadt Villach Freihausgasse, A-9500 Villach Tel.: +43(0)4242 / 205-3420 and/or -3450 E-Mail: kultur@villach.at · Web: www.villach.at Curator: Edith Eva Kapeller Exhibition setup: finnworks, Gerhard Fillei und Joachim Krenn On-site photographs: Gisela Erlacher, Meina Schellander Translated from the German by: Shawn Bryan Graphic design: Peter Putz · ewigesarchiv.at Opening hours: Wed.–Fri. 9 a.m.–1 p.m. and 2 p.m.–6 p.m., Sat. 9 a.m.–3 p.m. Admission free The exhibition runs until the 10th of September 2016.