Das fünfte Element
The sculptor Dieter Lutsch works with materials which have an everyday use, but then liberates them from their original role, utilising them for completely new purposes. His world is refreshingly free of constraints when it comes to the reallocation of meaning or importance - for instance, he makes holes in inflatable mattresses and declares them to be room fountains or he blows up wineskins in order to showcase them as balloons. Then again he joins hundreds of standard commercial wooden europallets to make a flight of stairs 25 metres long and 6 metres high, so that the observer can experience the amount of room that the staircase takes up. An ever-recurring element of his work is the use of washing foam, from which he creates rising pillars. For "The Fifth Element" he produces shapes from foam too, places billowing islands of foam on a carpet and names an installation of foam, wire and light bulb which hangs from the ceiling "Ceiling Light". And thus he constantly breaks away from original design and purpose, in order to assign space for a presentation in a totally new form.
It is no coincidence that the title of Lutsch's exhibition "The Fifth Element" reminds us of Luc Besson's film of the same name. With his title, Besson does cheekily draw inspiration from Buddhism and pre-Socratic philosophy, where the idea of a "fifth" element is identified as intangible yet connecting everything, but to suit Hollywood, Besson nominates the additional fifth element as love, which ultimately binds everything together and brings it into balance.
For "The Fifth Element" Dieter Lutsch uses the four base elements, fire, water, earth and air. The sculptor skilfully designates the fifth element as the gaze of the observer, the intellectual assimilation into the unique world of imagination and knowledge of each individual, for it is only through the world view of others that Lutsch would like to see his work completed. Without observers, with their own associations to breathe life into the sculptures, they will remain an accumulation of everyday items. They acquire intelligence only with the help of each viewer's own thoughts.
Born in 1974 in Schäßburg, Romania, the German artist lives and works in Berlin, where in 2008 he graduated from the Berlin-Weissensee University top of his class in sculpture under Karin Sander. "The Fifth Element" is Lutsch's second solo exhibition at the Jarmuschek + Partner Gallery. Dieter Lutsch is also showcased by the gallery at the Volta6 in Basel.
Trockenbau
Entering the arena of make-believe. Dieter Lutsch deprives objects of their original meaning. Through alienation, he transfigures the significance of the material and reassigns purpose. Columns made by the sculptor consist of billowy foam. He designs fountains of perforated mattresses and cubes of airy styrofoam. Whenever he works with stone, it is used in connection with pastries or a colorfulness you wouldn’t expect in the chosen material. “Dry mortarless construction” (Trockenbau), a term taken from the building trade in its original denomination constitutes the limited possibilities of construction. In the context fabricated by Lutsch, it grapples with expectation, form and curiosity. At the same time it inverts the original meaning of this term as it leads toward an openness and full sensation of space.
“Trockenbau” is a sculpture of stacked wooden pallets. Going against any inhibition people might feel in museums, this sculpture has to be walked upon and touched by the visitor. In interacting with this work of art, the observer is invited to experience a different form of comprehension of space. Walking through the sculpture it is thereby transformed into an installation that reveals space. Lutsch’s installation starts to entice the observer from far away, outside the confined space of the gallery, far off the centre. The irresistible Red Carpet of Arte Povera invites the visitor to follow the path and climb this hybrid Tower of Babel inside the gallery. Dieter Lutsch’s staging is accompanied by sounds that reveal their origin only after pacing around his sculpture.
Another piece by the artist: “Maneki Nekos” is an Asian lucky charm. The almost ruthless “sentimentalization” of these mascots by Western culture, in the form of “Waving Kitties“ is again exaggerated by Lutsch. He bereaves them of their intended significance and places them in an utterly new context, a musical one. Arranged in a formation adjusted to result in optimal sound, maniac plastic kittens knock on piled up glasses.
Born in 1974 in Transylvania, Romania, Dieter Lutsch grew up in Stuttgart. From 2001 to 2006 he studied sculpture at Kunsthochschule Berlin-Weissensee, graduating as Karin Sander’s master disciple. Jarmuschek+Partner now proudly presents Dieter Lutsch’s first solo show.
Jarmuschek+Partner