Dream Home Experience
Städtische Galerie Delmenhorst
28 November 2014 – 1 February 2015
The questions that make up the heady internal dialogue experienced when considering the purchase of a property are the leading thread through Kasia Fudakowski’s exhibition ‘Dream Home Experience’ at the Städtische Galerie Delmenhorst.
What do I want, what must I accept and what can I change or ignore?
The aesthetics and iconography of the real estate industry come into focus through Fudakowski’s ‘serving suggestion sculptures’, cautiously proposing a function, without offering any possibility of actual use. Suspended, disembodied hands perform an eternal key-exchange ritual, while obscenely giant keys, bent anthropomorphically into a grotesque kissing posture, echo the sometimes-absurd visual language of the industry. A plethora of company towels, yoga mats, mugs, pens, benches, carpets, etc., brand the interior of the Villa, imprinting the far reach of the industry’s arm onto our primordial desire for ownership.
In sharp contrast to the Villa’s romantic exterior, inside it is emblazoned with almost shockingly stern phrases adopted by architect Heinz Stoffregen and Dr Hermann Coburg during its planning: Fest und Streng (Hard and Strict), under which the visitor enters the building, or Über Alles die Pflicht (Above All Duty), in the doctor’s former smoking room. The typography of these original stucco expressions is translated throughout the exhibition into soft ceramics and stained glass, which embody not only the historic value that the building inhabits, but also its eccentric characteristics that must be accepted as a part of any purchase.
In addition the presence of older sculptures in their packed form also pervade the property’s interior. This abandoned work, a kind of ‘anti-retrospective’, mimics the remnants of a previous occupant, asking to be ignored while duplicitously dominating the space. Similarly, the irreverent collages within the accompanying publication – put together from real estate print paraphernalia, photographs of her own sculptures and the empty gallery rooms – deprive one another of their relative status and become ripe victims for the dark humour that prevails throughout ‘Dream Home Experience’.
