B1|A40 THE BEAUTY OF THE GRAND ROAD

pretations, as Kolding emphasizes: “I have come to appreciate how, for
instance, a man upside down can be a comment on power, on the use of
space in a very concrete sense, a literal expression of seeing things from
a new perspective, or how it can express a kind of existential feeling.“ 7
The major trait shared by all collages – apart from their reduction to
black-and-white values – is found in their relative isolation. “The space
of non-place,” Augé states, “creates neither singular identity nor relations;
only solitude, and similitude.” 8 Thus all the installed works correspond
to some degree to that which is already there; the tiger, for instance,
will be perceived as in some way connected to the lawn behind
the guardrail as its potential habitat, and the umpire positioned in front
of an underpass like a doorman will be seen in the context of a colorful
figurative graffiti on the tunnel wall. Without doubt they are contained
in situations which also include the beholders. Yet there is no coherent
narrative, no superlative meaning (nor can there be, in view of their heterogeneous
sources and designs) which they can offer up to them. Their
anti-illusionistic effect is, moreover, enhanced by their two-dimensionality
and their shadowy-abstract backsides. Thus they are reflecting
the non-place they are positioned in while using it in their idiosyncratic,
subjective way without attempting to conjure up a utopian mirage before
the eyes of the real-life residents and passers-by at the Frillendorfer
Platz.
BARBARA HESS
1| Chtcheglov, Ivan: “Formulary for a New Urbanism“, in: Internationale Situationniste
No. 1, Paris 1953, in: [09.07.2015].
2| Henri Lefèbvre on the Situationist International. Interview conducted and translated
by Kristin Ross in 1983, in: October No. 79, Winter 1997, in: [09.07.2015].
3| For more information on this subject and on Debord’s definition of “psychogeography“,
see: Dziewior, Yilmaz: “Psychogeographie“, in: Jakob Kolding. exh. cat.,
Kunstverein in Hamburg, Stuttgart 2001, p. 4–14; ill. on p. 21.
4| Fried, Michael: “Art and Objecthood“, 1967, in: http://bcnm.berkeley.edu/
nwmedia201/readings/FriedObjcthd.pdf, p. 3.
5| Morris, Robert: “Notes on Sculpture“, in: Artforum, Vol. V, No. 2, Los Angeles 1966.
6| Augé, Marc: Non-Places. Introduction to an Anthropology of Supermodernity,
London/New York 1995.
7| Kolding, Jakob: “Like Shadows. A Conversation between Jacob Proctor and Jakob
Kolding”, in: Jakob Kolding, Shifting Realities, exh. cat., University of Michigan
Museum of Art, Zürich 2001, p. 21–25, here: p. 22 f.
8| See note 6, here: p. 103.
160