Tobias Buche
€ 15
Tobias Buche
Mar 10 – May 13, 2007
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Installation view Kunstverein Braunschweig
On the second floor of the Kunstverein the Berlin artist Tobias Buche (b. 1978) has compiled on partitions and screens a wealth of found pictorial material to create a visual cultural history of our times. Pictures from newspapers, magazines, catalogues, private photos, record covers or drawings are juxtaposed on the partitions without following a linear narrative thread. The viewer reconstructs the associative order by jumping from image to image, occasionally connecting them to his own memories, sometimes guessing or inventing how they are interrelated and frequently being unable to decipher them. In its consistency and juxtaposition of high and mass cultures Buche’s approach stands in the tradition of the Mnemosyne Atlas as created by Aby Warburg.
The possibility of new constellations is an inherent part of his pictorial collations and is clearly made visible – recognizable in the holes left by pins that were repeatedly used to attach and remove the images. To avoid a pre-determined view of the visual material, Buche always seeks to achieve an equality in the nature of the source material. Thus the images are presented in a widely unified black and white. Also in terms of quality he modifies the image by improving some photos digitally while others are made worse by changing contrasts and colour values. Images that are anchored in our collective memories are included only after some time has passed so as to make them accessible to new interpretation. To heighten this effect, Buche also decontextualizes the photos by cropping them or extracting an apparently minor detail. This means in the end – a private photo, a newspaper photo of a political demonstration, the cover of a favourite disc, the reproduction of an art work, the portrait of a Hollywood actor, the detail of a political or social event – nothing can be clearly classified according to its origin. Everything is of equal importance.
Despite their sculptural appearance, the screens displaying the collection of images are above all and primarily a neutral medium that does not focus on itself. Furthermore by making the art work independent of the walls of the exhibition space, it becomes possible for the artist to develop, on the whole, his pictorial material without having to consider the given physical space. At the same time their placement indicates to some degree the direction in which the images can be read.
Apart from his compilation of images on screens and partitions, Buche will be showing at the Kunstverein for the first time two new series of drawings: shopping and book lists on which traces of soot and fire result in oddly symmetrical patterns but also sand paper with folds and remnants on it that create mysterious romantic depictions. Both series question traditional ideas of the creative process in that they were created by chance, albeit guided by the artist, and by the wear and tear or even destruction of trivial objects of every day use.
Buche’s work has already been displayed in national and international galleries and group exhibitions, such as the last Berlin Biennale.
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