Dieter Lutsch
Das fünfte Element

Opening reception June 11th, 2010, 6:00 – 9:00 p.m.
June 12th – July 24th, 2010

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.