Raphael Langmair

THE BUTCHER’S CHOICE
11.05.2013 – 01.06.2013

Apice for Artists welcomes Raphael Langmair for a solo presentation. Starting point for the conversation is a curiosity which arouses when seeing in his work a constellation of physical actions and more impulsive gestures folding out in time.

DA: The importance of natural processes in framing the three-dimensional object in space is a visual aspect in your work. In which manner does the notion of temporality influences the transition of the used material to its composed image?

RL: While looking at simple natural processes affected by the changing seasons, I realized that the most effective natural force is time itself. Every physical and even mental material is somehow affected by it. Just as mountains and seas, ideas change in the process of time. I can look at something for half a second or take my time and let it sink. A lifetime is just a second in world history. What is possible in a specific time-frame? The video 21min 15sec shows an ice-cream slowly melting in the sun. The experience of time is like a struggle between concentration and boredom and it’s notedly personal. While watching the video one jumps back and forth from observing a physical event, to entering a meditative state of mind.

DA: What I find interesting is the time frame you are talking about. It seems to me that the physical condition of the material frames itself just by unfolding its natural process in time. How are you dealing with this specific state and the notion of creating an artificial composition?

RL: There always comes a point when I have to decide which moment of the work I show. The beginning, the process, the product or nothing. The moment frames the work and practically determines it’s form. Sometimes the most interesting moment is the work setting, the relation between tools, materials and the making. The chaos of things little later calls for for order. I’m constantly making a mess and cleaning up again.

DA: Within this process of creating and composing you leave room for reflection. In your sculptural intervention next to the entrance for example, the accumulation of postal advertisements chains the working momentum to something more infinite, to a habitual gesture of receiving these advertisements. How does the real-time surroundings interferes with your temporary events?

RL: By freezing a spontaneous event in concrete, it is continued forever. It wil always look like it just happened and carry something of the present to the future. It is almost like we wittness the appearance of the work. It lives in our head. There is a small chance of actually hearing the metal mailbox open&shut and catching a glimpse of the mail falling in. The order of chance fascinates me. I like the idea of the mailman participating in the work without knowing it. As a messenger he connects and confronts two worlds.