PHOTOGRAPHIC GALLERY HIPPOLYTE
Kalevankatu 18 B, 00100 Helsinki, Finland
+358 9 612 33 44, www.hippolyte.fi

THE SIGN OF FEAR
Günter Brus, Ville Mäkikoskela, Harri Pälviranta, Stefanie Wuschitz
4 July – 3 August 2007
Opening hours: Mon-Fri 12:00-17:00 h

 

Ville Mäkikoskela, Harri Pälviranta and Stefanie Wuschitz will talk about their work in the gallery on Wednesday 4 July, starting at 5 PM. - Welcome!

 

The Sign of Fear is the summer exhibition of Gallery Hippolyte, featuring artists Günter Brus (Austria), Ville Mäkikoskela (Finland), Harri Pälviranta (Finland) and Stefanie Wuschitz (Austria/USA) who in their work address the issue of violence both on a personal level, as well as in society at large. The exhibition is curated by the photographic artist Jari Silomäki.

Günter Brus (b. 1938) is one of the founding members of the Vienna Actionists. The Actionists' practice and approach included such things as playing with faeces or sexuality, and also violence and the slaughter of animals. In his work, Brus has explored methods of suffering and self-destruction. The show in the Hippolyte features a documentation of Brus's performance called Zerreissprobe from 1970, which also ended his career as an actionist. The work is presented in the gallery in the form of a photographic documentation.

Ville Mäkikoskela's (b. 1975) sculptural installation Weight of the World is a dramatic tableau before or after an encounter with faceless "evil". It can also be seen as a snapshot of the disintegration of the self. The person occupying the centre of the work is present through an absence, which appears in the form of a trace and a shell.

In his photographic series Guns at Home, Harri Pälviranta (b. 1971) has photographed firearms in people's homes in Albania. The guns are either legal hunting weapons, or illegal arms from the 1997 revolution, which the owners have neglected to return to the State. The guns embody the fear present in the life of Albanians. Pälviranta's pictures give a clear sense that these guns are not for leisure or prestige, they are there for a much more serious purpose.

Stefanie Wuschitz's (b. 1981) Tetescha us is an animated film that got its start in a cartoon workshop organised by Wuschitz in the Palestinian refugee camp of Beddawi in the north of Lebanon. Palestinian girls drew pictures of how they see different realities, and Stefanie Wuschitz based her animation on the pictures. The central theme in the work is the idea of the impossibility of presenting the conflicts in the Middle East in the form of a single, coherent story.

For more information please contact:
Exhibition co-ordinator Petronella Grönroos, +358 9 612 33 44, firstname.lastname@hippolyte.fi

Günter Brus: Zerreisprobe, 1970 (photo Klaus Eschen) [Courtesy of Galerie Heike Curtze, Vienna, Austria]