LIECHTENSTEIN.- Clemens von Wedemeyer (*1974 in Göttingen, DE) features in the Kunstmuseum Liechtenstein collection with three characteristic video installations and two sculptural works. The solo show devised in close collaboration with the artist combines a selection of these with recent works.

“My stories often arise in the context of a found situation and a place”, Clemens von Wedemeyer observes. The artist, whose film and media installations often operate in the realm between real situations and speculative retellings, explores structural principles in both social and historical contexts and also in the film medium itself. For example, the circumstances in which he creates his works generally form an integral part of his works. One focus of the exhibition is on the relationship between film and sculpture and their implicit historiography. The show illustrates how sculptures can seemingly be brought to life and how the immaterial can assume form.

The display is centred around the film Otjesd from 2005, that is being shown together with the accompanying documentary The Making of Otjesd. Otjesd (Leaving) is about the procedure of emigrating from Russia to Germany. This re-enactment is based upon impressions gained by von Wedemeyer while researching in Moscow in 2004. In Berlin-Pankow, along the former “death zone”, the artist used Russian immigrants as performers to re-enact the scene of them queuing for visas outside the German consulate in Moscow. Different moments create a sense of the turbulence and irritation at the checkpoint. The film was shot in a single uncut fifteen-minute take and is screened as an endless loop.

The Making of Otjesd affords an insight into research material, depicts the film’s setting and has the performers recount their own migration experiences. The piece created for the first Moscow Biennale, where it was screened, is a timely political statement in view of the current war situation.

A Recovered Bone (2001: A Space Odyssey) from 2015 is the artist’s first three-dimensionally printed work and embodies an iconic object from the history of film: a bone flung into the air, only to transform into a spaceship–familiar from the opening scene of Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)–is rendered with the aid of cutting-edge 3D printing technology into a three-dimensional form reminiscent of an archaeological find. Untitled (Cleopatra) from 2014– 2019, on the other hand, appears to be an attempt by von Wedemeyer to bring to life a sculpture that is in the process of discovering its language.

The exhibition also features the monumental video installation Vermin of the Sky (Brno Piece), 2017, in which digitised sculptures, statues and monuments float weightlessly through the darkness of outer space. Not only are they divested of their representative, commemorative function, they are smashed to pieces, becoming asteroids or, figuratively, “dust”.

Blue prints exhibited in showcases afford an insight into Clemens von Wedemeyer’s current project, in which he focuses on the following question: how do invisible data and abstract algorithms that define our everyday life become visible?

Clemens von Wedemeyer (*1974 in Göttingen, Germany) lives and works in Berlin and is Professor of Media Art at the Academy of Fine Arts Leipzig. The artist and film-maker studied Photography and Media at the University of Applied Sciences and Arts Bielefeld and the Academy of Fine Arts Leipzig, graduating from Astrid Klein’s masterclass in 2005. Clemens von Wedemeyer participated in various group exhibitions including at the 1st Moscow Biennale (2005), the 4th Berlin Biennale (2006), Skulptur Projekte Münster 2007, the 16th Biennale of Sydney (2008) and dOCUMENTA (13) (2012). His solo shows include at MoMA PS1, New York, ARGOS Centre for Art and Media, Brussels, Barbican Art Centre, London, Frankfurter Kunstverein, Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, and Hamburger Kunsthalle.

Before the opening, there will be an artist talk with Christiane Meyer-Stoll, Letizia Ragaglia and Clemens von Wedemeyer on Thursday, 31 August at 5pm. In cooperation with Liechtensteinische Kunstgesellschaft.

A Kunstmuseum Liechtenstein production curated by Christiane Meyer-Stoll.

Kunstmuseum Liechtenstein
In the Context of the Collection: Clemens von Wedemeyer
September 1st, 2023 - January 28th, 2024