Exhibition text, Adrian Buschmann, Gabriele Senn Galerie, Wien, 2018

Spannen wir das Pferd von hinten auf. Adrian Buschmann sagt Sachen wie: “Genauso wie ich die großformatigen (Bilder) letztendlich für Menschen male, die denen in den Bildern ähneln, male ich die kleinen Bilder für die großen”, und deklariert somit kurzum die Legitimation des Bilder-anderen-Bildern-Widmens. Mit derselben Souveränität schlüpft er in das Schaffen jener verstorbenen Kollegen, in wessen Werken er Nähe zur eigenen Arbeit erkennt.
Die Deleuz’sche enculage heraufbeschwörend, macht Buschmann seinen Vorgängern sozusagen posthum Bastarde. Womöglich schwingt das beiläufig im Titel der Ausstellung mit, der auf Italienisch fröhlich klingt, sich aber ins Deutsche mit “befleckt” übersetzen lässt.
Die Werke anderer Künstler benutzt er jedenfalls auch als Urlaub von der eigenen Person. Weitere Formen von Distanz bewirkt er beispielsweise indem er die schon erwähnten kleinformatigen Bilder mittels Herauslösens bestimmter Linien, die in den großen bereits vorkommen, herstellt.
Entscheidend sind für ihn in dieser Hinsicht rein ästhetische Gesichtspunkte.
Anhand solcher Dekontextualisierung werden Teile seines Oeuvres gleich in das Genre der Abstraktion verortet.
All diese Facetten von Entfremdung eröffnen dem Betrachter einen Spielraum, der die Hemmschwelle zur Eigeninterpretation bedeutend verringert. Unterstützt wird dies ferner durch den Verzicht auf Autorenschaftsansprüchen, der seiner Herangehensweise innewohnt.
Signifikant ist, dass er seine 2015 begonnene Auseinandersetzung mit den Arbeiten des polnischen Künstlers Leon Chwistek wieder aufgreift. Ein Gedanke, den er erstens gerne zu Ende gedacht haben möchte, und welcher zweitens angesichts des eigenen Szenenwechsels, vom ligurischen Meer zurück in die Stadt, neu herangezogen werden darf.
Chwistek’s Zeichnungen illustrierten eine privilegierte Gesellschaft zu Beginn des 20. Jahrhunderts, die sich wohl hauptsächlich in Vergnügungen zu zerstreuen sucht. Buschmann’s hyperminimale malerische Cover-versionen tragen die bei Chwistek implizierten feingesellschaftlichen Gebärden in die Gegenwart. Kontemporäre Signa wie Geräte oder aktuelle Mode unterlässt er, weil er findet, dass sich ohnehin wenig am Wesentlichen geändert hat. Er hat eher Interesse an bezeugbaren Affekten und an Formen, als an Äußerlichkeiten auf dieser Ebene. Die Gegenwartsfähigkeit der Bilder, die er okkupiert ist also schon gegeben.
Die Rolle des Striches ist dermaßen übergeordnet, dass sich Referenzen hierzu gelegentlich im Titel in Form von Wortspiel finden. So zB beim “SS2018” betitelten Bild, ein zu Modemedien gehörendes Kürzel für Spring/Summer, hier eingesetzt um auf S-förmige Linien in der Silhouette der beiden im Bild dargestellten Figuren hinzuweisen.
Adrian Buschmann makes statements such as: ‘Just as I paint the larger ones [sic paintings] for people who look like those in them, I paint the small ones for their big siblings.’, thus legitimising the dedication of paintings to other paintings.
With the same sovereignty he slips into the opus of passed away fellows in which he detects vicinage to his own works. Evoking Deleuze’s enculage, Buschmann produces in a manner of speaking their posthum bastards. This resonates perhaps incidentally with the title of the exhibition, which sounds cheerful in Italian (macchiato), but whose meaning, translated to German or English (maculose), reveals a more sinister and awkward tone.
To Buschmann, works of other artists resemble a holiday from himself. By dislocating particular lines from the large paintings onto the smaller ones as another method of distancing, and with aesthetic considerations alone as criteria, such decontextualisation shifts parts of his oeuvre to the genre of abstraction. All these facets of separation and estrangement beget a space with diminished barriers to the onlooker’s own interpretations.
This is further being supported by the disclaimed authorship inherent in the artist’s approach.
Significant for this exhibition is Buschmann’s revisit of Leon Chwistek’s works, an endeavour the artist was already occupied with in 2015. Given his change of residence, from the Ligurian Sea back to the city, Buschmann sensed that there were contemplations that still called for completion, especially in the now “new” environment.
Chwistek’s drawings depict socialites at the early 20th century, a privileged circle on the quest for pleasure above all. The gestures in Chistwick’s illustrations imply refinement. Buschmann transports them via hyper-minimalist pictorial cover versions into the present. Contemporary insignia, such as fashion and devices, are missing completely, as essentials never have seemed to have changed anyway. The artist’s attention is therefore more geared towards affects and forms than this kind of formalities, which further assures the even transference of the pictures he occupies to the current.
Lines bear such a weight in Buschmann’s body of work, that references can be frequently found in the titles of the paintings, sometimes as puns: i.e. the painting titled “SS2018”, in the world of fashion commonly used to abbreviate Spring/Summer, but used here to hint at the silhouette of the figures depicted in the painting.

Exhibition text, Hanna Putz, Parasol Unit, London 2017

In 1971 the first woman aquired a professional motocross rider license, but had to return that license once it was disclosed that she wasn’t male.
Motocross is a sport that requires extreme amounts of mental resilience and incessant pushing of one’s limits. Surpassing restrictions, i.e. physical givens, is simply routine.
During her stay in Yekaterinenburg Hanna Putz met „Sasha“ a female motocross rider. Adopting characteristics that are deemed male, rumbling through the grid of common social constructs, this woman with a rather boyish, fragile body shape seems to conquer several male domains in one strike and with remarkable implicitness.
Her also present partner retrieves into the background and assumes an assisting role, perhaps becoming something like her extension when her physical strenght does not suffice, an astonishing, inversion of all the preceding surprises in this series. He also holds one of her dogs, fighting dogs with fear inducing frames.
Putz catches moments in which qualities that are distinctly perceived to be feminine are still appearing, a wariness in the handling of the machine, an almost fostering kind of taking control of the comparatively massive vehicle. As if faced with the care of the circus rider towards its animal, the woman retains grace in the midst of the sludge she is plunging into, like a gentle choreography.
There are two photographs that amplify the manifold of this series. In one, she stands with her partner, and while the bond between the lovers is almost tangible, a distance remains, probably being aware of the need to maintain independence during the race. In another one, her big dog overwhelms her with love, but not without the automatic reigning in of its physical power, which, in this frame, works like a mirroring of what Sasha is undertaking.
Perhaps the most striking fact is that during the race Sasha is not identifiable as a woman. In addition, her nickname, derived from Aleksandra, is used for both, men and women in Russia. Her suit, plastered with advertising, evolves from mere protective measure to a standard bearer uniform, as it is common for any sportsperson. But this just further underlines the contrast between the utilisation of a person for commercial purpose and its egalitarian handling beyond sex and the otherwise accentuated gender oriented contextualisation in our society. Human advertising colums are the traditional heroes of the present era, standing out as the best seems to naturally grant you such honors. Nowadays we have induced this rite of persona as status and currency into various areas, having spread gradually from celebrities to social media phenomenon. Personal preferences become assets, one day they might replace what we call soft skills today.
Following Sasha through the race the series ends in a rave, a mass with male nudity on display. In this light the precursory photographs almost seem to be a preparatory act, a dulling, that leads to this apparently harsh event.
This series contains fundamental dichotomies, incorporating tenderness and the raw, finesse and impetuosity, often in one photograph. The effortless reconciliation of opposites urges us to question obsolete assumptions and the need for categories.