Rausch

25.08.2022 - 27.08.2022

Aline Witschi, Andrin Engel, Dara Maillard, Etienne Eisele, Hanna Köpfle, hongsue, Linda Christa Bill & Lara Trinkler, Lucy Neidhart, Rosanna Monteleone, Niki Yelim, Oliver Kümmerli, Ramon Iten, Samantha Zaugg & Murielle Gräff, Saskia Sutter, Shawn Teh, Valerie Geissbühler 

Zentralwäscherei, Zürich

Organized by the ETWAS KOLLEKTIV, the exhibition questions and delves into the concept of "RAUSCH” (english term: intoxication). This theme encompasses human desire, altered states, and processes. "RAUSCH" represents both a potentiality and a lure for escaping or crafting new realities. Beyond intoxications, it delves into terms like euphoria, sensory perceptions, refuge, desire, and illusion. The aim is an open exploration of this rarely discussed yet ever-present topic, in collaboration with 16 young artists. The artworks explore "RAUSCH" through bodily states, feminism, consumption, and religion. The exhibition amplifies diverse voices, seeking to understand when, where, and how "RAUSCH" occurs, and whether it is individual, collective, or hybrid.

The ETWAS Kollektiv is a collective created by a group of eight friends, who share a connection within the arts and cultural sphere. Born in 1999, they are all students specializing in diverse fields, including fine arts, art education, scenography, history, literature, cultural sciences, video, and chemistry. Their collaborative effort resulted in the realization of two group exhibitions: "Etwas Neus," held at Shedhalle Zug in August 2020, and "Rausch," showcased at Zentralwäscherei, Zürich, in August 2022.In the words of the collective: “We are committed to the promotion of exhibitions and cultural events together with artists and pursue to provide a platform for their work and to enable an inter-disciplinary exchange.”

In the context of the exhibition, I have presented the piece It Seeks my Luster, built from Gold and Ashes, and rises, and falls.

I investigate subject matters which can be read as the pillars of eastern and western European civilizations, such as their rites and traditions, systems of belief and religion, conceptions of good and evil just as the forms in which they are passed down, including myths, folklore, poetry. The exhibited work is inspired by an experience during which the artist came across a liturgical orthodox image.

Journal Entry Extract, 20/02/2022: "I noticed there was a small orthodox icon of Saint Sebastian hanging above his bed. It caught my eye, then the strangest thing occurred. It started moving, breathing. Meanwhile, I forgot I had a body. The icon gradually overtook more and more space in my conscience, until it covered his whole bedroom, the entire existing space. And gravity vanished. I was caught in layers of gold. The piece crosses the boundaries between the defined and the blurred, the two- dimensional and material, the spiritual and earthly sphere. It flows into a transcendental experience. The viewer is invited to come in direct physical and intimate contact with the iconographical work by lifting the canvas and thus enter its layers."