In Flagranti

With her artistic intervention in the chapel of Museum Schloss Moyland, Isabella Fürnkäs enters into a subtle exchange with the historically charged spaces of the museum: as a scholarship holder of the BERLIN MASTERS 2022 funding programme, the artist spent six weeks in Saint-Rémy-de-Provence as part of the Schliemann Residency, where she developed, among other things, the new video installation for the museum. With her site-specific multimedia installation, a room within a room is created on site, the opening of which takes the visitor to Tokyo. Furthermore, the artist is showing large-format drops made of specially hand-blown ruby glass, which open up an exciting dialogue with Georg Meistermann’s windows.

- Text by Antje-Britt Mählmann

“What actually is an aura? A strange web of space and time: the unique appearance of a distance, however close it may be.” Inspired by the thoughts of the famous philosopher and cultural critic Walter Benjamin, the exhibition challenges and redefines the boundaries of space and time. For Benjamin, the aura was a central concept to describe the changes in the perception of works of art in the age of technical reproducibility.

Isabella Fürnkäs (*1988 in Tokyo, lives in Berlin) deals with questions of physical and spatial intimacy, the influence of digitalization on interpersonal relationships, and changes in social communication patterns. Handmade clay models of cell phones contrast the flawless surfaces and presentation methods of smartphones and, in turn, ridicule them - how much of our inner selves do we transfer to these small, lifeless devices? A video installation is almost a peephole through which we gain voyeuristic insights into the privacy and intimacy of our everyday lives. Casually observed, private gestures in public are combined with an installation of drop-like glass objects, forming disturbingly intimate images. In Flagranti is the title of the installation, which creates an intimate experiential space and reflects the viewer’s own vulnerability.

- Text by Jennifer Cierlitza