Mariechen Danz (Dublin, 1980) combines sculpture, costumes, drawings and performance, among other things, in her work. So too in her new presentation Ore Oral Orientation, which she is showing at Viva Arte Viva.
Could you describe what drives you as an artist? What do you see as your main inspirations and influences?
My work explores the history of knowledge transfer with the aim of investigating errors and misunderstandings within it. I do this through and with the human body. I work mainly with sculpture and installations and at times bring them to life through vocal performances that further deepen and explain the themes of the work. I employ vocal sounds and music partly because of the accessibility of the medium, such as in pop music, for example, and partly because of the possibility of using sounds of the body to evoke emotions. I collaborate with Alex Stolze from the band UNMAP and also have a musical collaboration with Gediminas Zygus aka J.G.Biberkopf. Both contributed to the scores for my performances at the Venice Biennale 2017.
Could you give a brief description of the work you created for the 57th edition of the Venice Biennale?
Ore Oral Orientation is presented as a two-dimensional map that unfolds itself in space. The walls are covered with (three-dimensional) footprints that create paths through different timelines and raw materials, such as earth, sand, coal and cement. The floor, podium and plinths are made of Venetian clay, recycled and taken from a building by Anna Heringer / Martin Rauch / Andres Lepick, one of the contributions to the Biennale Architettura 2016.
There are several sculptures in the space including the two main interactive anatomical figures: The Dig of No Body, a 'soil sample' in the form of a body made up of loose movable layers, and Womb Tomb, a reclining figure whose thermochromic skin changes colour with touch and changes of room temperature so that underlying patterns become visible.
The timeline springs from the raw ground, the clay - to refined ground, in the form of stamped and aluminium plates depicting world maps and technical symbols. Designed for the windows in the Arsenale, the modular metal plates show changes in world maps from the earliest Babylonian era to the 20th century. The central work in the space is the performance video Knot in Arrow: Ore Oral Orientation, the activation of the installation by myself and the performers I work with, Ronel Doual, Marko Lakobrija and Brandon Rosenbluth. Through voice and song, it highlights the (subjective) transmission of knowledge throughout history and asks whether it is possible to be able to transcend our own imposed boundaries.
How does this work relate to Christine Macel's general curatorial theme for Viva Arte Viva?
Christine Macel has divided the Viva Arte Viva exhibition into separate pavilions, each with its own theme. My work is housed in the Dionysian Pavilion. This pavilion focuses on embodiment and the corporeal. I work with song, storytelling, movement and the animistic relationship the performers have with the objects and artworks in my installations. This multi-sensory approach fits well with the works and artists brought together in this pavilion.
What did participating in the Venice Biennale 2017 bring you? Did it result in new projects, works, activities or ideas?
For the Venice Biennale 2017, I started my first collaboration with Alicja Kwade, with whom I have been friends since my student days in Berlin. Our collaboration consisted of a new performance I made for her at the marble and stone globes Pars Pro Toto at the Arsenale. Part of this performance was a layered costume made of 50 metres of fabric printed with elements from Kerstin Braetschs' experimental marble-like paper works. Both Kwade's stone spheres and Braetsch's works relate to abstract forms that evoke beta-images. This inspired me to combine them to create a subjective map that incorporated astronomy, biology, geology and geography into a live 'hörspiel' soundscape that dives in and out of a pop song format and micro/macro language. The score was created in collaboration with musician Gediminas Zygus and UNMAP. The costume acted as the script, while the large stone spheres were both stage and instrument for myself and acrobat Saleh Yazdani, whose choreography was a slow motion of interactive gestures between the human body and Alicja Kwade's planetary installation. I am currently working on my first public sculpture for the Highline in New York, an invitation that came about through Cecilia Alemani, curator of the Italian pavilion who saw my work at the Arsenale. That is a highlight for me.
Published on 22 November 2017.
