October 2001
Geometrical Affairs
New acquisitions and works from the collection
Josef Albers
Gottfried HoneggerCamille Graeser
Gail Haistings
Karin Sander
Sylvie Fleury
John Armleder
John Armleder
b.1948 in Geneva/CHUntitled, 1998
2 tubular lamps, canvas, 400 cm x 80 cmJohn Armleder discovered two identical tubular lamps in a Berlin design shop in 1988. He bough them to use for a "furniture sculpture" combining an abstract painting with an industrially manufactured object, a readymade. Armleder placed the lamps on the central axis of a long, narrow, monochrome red canvas, so that the picture looks like a painting by Barnett Newman or a combination of Barnett Newman and Dan Flavin. But at a fleeting glance it could easily be taken for a designer lamp, as actually often happens.
The "furniture sculptures" confront high culture with banality, and are thus an ironic comment on the continuing aestheticization of the everyday. At the same time they show how art is increasingly being influenced by everyday life, and the consequences of trivializing art's content and values.