In Terminal, Jesse Stecklow’s first solo museum exhibition in Europe, the exhibition space becomes a waiting room.
The cornerstone of his artistic practice is the collection, analysis and circulation of ecological data, mostly invisible to the human eye. The Los Angeles-based artist works with a clearly defined repertoire of objects that oscillate between image, text, and sound. Jesse Stecklow’s sculptures enter into a direct dialogue with their surroundings, merging with them as it were. Stecklow is less concerned with the individual object than with the different narratives that emerge through site-specific contextual shifts.
Stecklow describes his objects as characters that assume different roles depending on the situation and thus take on multiple identities in the form of divergent versions.
In the “waiting room,” the exhibition space, Stecklow uses displays that take on a hybrid form between a baggage carousel and a dining table to structure the presentation of his objects in different versions. A decision that can be traced back to the pandemic-induced shift between public and private spaces: while the once heavily populated airport terminals became increasingly empty, the previously lonely dining tables filled up and now act as office and school desks, as it were.
Jesse Stecklow. Terminal
20. – 25.09.2022
mumok
Museumsplatz 1
1070 Vienna
www.mumok.at
