BERLIN.- Galerie Guido W. Baudach is presenting attitudes of heat, the third solo show of Philipp Modersohn with the gallery. The Berlin based artist (*1986) in his practice examines the relation of nature, art and society. Philipp Modersohn has participated in various exhibitions at home and abroad, e.g. Ich bin ein Riss, ich will durch Wände gehen, Salon Dahlmann, Berlin, 2018; Ausstellen des Ausstellens, Staatliche Kunsthalle Baden-Baden, 2017; verbacken & verwittern, Oldenburger Kunstverein, 2016 (solo); Loose Container, Galerie Karin Guenther, Hamburg, 2015 (solo); Die Punktierung der Sphaerenarena, Tiergarten, Berlin, 2014 (solo); Spacerologia, Manitiusa Park, Poznan, 2013. Philipp Modersohn is one of the co-founders of The Intensive Independent International Amateur Academy. From May 2020 his work will be shown in the exhibition object notes at Kunstverein Goettingen.
The tribunal has entered its 103rd week. It was always going to be long, but the depth and complexity of this undertaking have not truly been understood, even by this jaded court reporter. In the words of an unnamed piece of Gneiss, “It’s taken us millions of years to get here, did you think we could unpack it in a week?” This may be the greatest challenge the tribunal faces. Humanity struggles to conceptualise time in a meaningful way if it extends beyond its own existence, while Sedimentary Rock sees Humanity as a mere blip. Gases seem to not experience time at all. The complexity of this tribunal grows by the day; both logistically and conceptually.
Today’s session saw the lead special prosecutor, a noble looking cube of Glass, set out a framework it will use to assess the responsibilities Concrete must bear in relation to the current warming of the planet. The prosecution spent considerable time questioning a contingent of Greenhouse Gases; the responses painted a fractious picture of the relationship between Concrete and the Gases.
Glass is carrying on with its strategy of clearly defining a framework for which the responsibility of climatic eventualities can be fairly assigned. It was explained that to assign responsibility a true understanding of the effects of each and every material must be interrogated, their motives made clear, and only then can the tribunal make its final judgement.
In one rousing moment Concrete objected to taking any responsibility claiming that, as it was man-made, how could Concrete bear responsibility for its own creation. The prosecutor replied, “Ours is a system in which there is no outside, so there can be no such thing as unintended consequences, there are only consequences. And this tribunal’s job is to lay them bare.”
There is no indication as to when the tribunal will be able to arrive at a final decision. There is no question, however, that the judgement it delivers will define the age. While the last few weeks have been slow and drawn out, the cross-examination of Carbon Dioxide scheduled for next Tuesday promises to turn the heat up dramatically.
--Harry Haddon
