With her associative assemblages in which she incorporates archive material from Camera Austria, Özlem Altin creates new works – perhaps precisely those works that the archive previously lacked.
Curated by Reinhard Braun (AT)
Viewing, arranging, adding: the Berlin-based artist Özlem Altin stages sequences specific to particular spaces that combine her own drawings and photographs with material from her extensive collection. In recent years, Altin has added works of other artists and positioned the sequences of images and texts from a wide range of sources in various museum collections. Provisional and precise in equal measure, her work is reminiscent of artistic research and temporary forms of presentation. Her installations seem to invite us to view the material and to rearrange it in our minds for an upcoming project.
For the exhibition at steirischer herbst, Camera Austria has given Altin access to its archive. The collection and documentation of an institution with its specific interests and attempts at historicisation meets intuitive, subjective collecting and ordering as an artistic practice that is not driven by rules.
Can Altin add something to the Camera Austria archive that has not been accounted for, and can she unearth something in the archive that it does not wish to reveal? Will she perhaps create those images for the exhibition that are missing in the archive?
Co-produced by steirischer herbst, Camera Austria
