Reinhold Budde
Plattform
12.11. – 31.12.2017
“Site-specific”, ‘in-situ’, ‘site-specificity’ are terms and descriptions of aesthetic strategies and concepts that are diametrically opposed to the closed concept of the work. “Site-specific” is considered to be art that, depending on the situation, refers to architectural, functional, historical, sociological and political aspects of the exhibition location. Reinhold Budde has dedicated himself primarily to spatial strategies that intervene precisely in existing spatial structures. Starting with painting, the Bremen-based artist has extended his concept further and further into the space. The works detach themselves from the wall, penetrate the space or are produced exclusively for a specific spatial constellation. For example, his exhibitions in Bremen at the Gerhard-Marcks-Haus (2013), the Galerie des Westens (2014), the Atelierhaus Friesenstraße (2016), the garden pavilion of the Malkasten e.V. in Düsseldorf (2015) and the Kunstverein Ruhr in Essen (2017). The exhibition at the Kunsthalle Bremerhaven also reveals a specific approach to space. Reinhold Budde knows that space cannot be conquered without staging it.
“Platform” is the title of the exhibition at the Kunsthalle Bremerhaven and refers to changes to the gallery, which immediately becomes the starting point for an aesthetic commentary. Eight white lacquered aluminum profile strips act as supports, seeming to carry the gallery, but retaining their sculptural qualities. Ultimately, their function remains enigmatic; the viewer finds himself in a space of the indeterminable.
The view from the gallery into the room is magically drawn to a wall work. The wall surface is blackened and a permeable black filament mat is attached in front of it. The mat, which is attached at a slight distance from the wall, gives the work depth and finds its way into the room and into three-dimensionality. The material chosen creates a connection to the reality outside the picture. Budde reacts pointedly to the urban environment, his interventions open up to other areas of social reality and relativize the hermeneutics of self-referential strategies and concepts. Another intervention is exemplary of his work: Reinhold Budde has attached a curtain made of movable red flannel panels in front of the cloakroom installation. Does this intervention deprive the cloakroom of its actual function, does the cloakroom become a work of art where the postulate “don’t touch” applies, or is it still a cloakroom? Stripped of its original function, the cloakroom undergoes a change in meaning and opens up an imaginary level.
His spatial interventions, carried out with craftsmanship precision, are able to restructure their surroundings and intervene in the movements of the visitors. These interventions always aim to change the existing situation, allow different ways of reading it and open up spaces for association and thought. Reinhold Budde proves to be a border crosser between genres, because he works with monochrome surfaces, designs objects and creates spatial situations. His works offer a complex play of perceptual offers, aiming at condensations - condensations of paradoxes, atmospheres and spatial situations. An interlocking of apparently contradictory elements takes place. Budde’s concentration on space-related strategies and concepts has long contributed to the high acceptance of his work.
Dr. Joachim Kreibohm
Curated by Thomas Trümper.