Sarah Pichlkostner (AT)

Sarah Pichlkostner – K: "So darlin', darlin', stand by me, I just wanna stay in bed today" (2018)
Hybrids (2018)
Photography Gert Jan van Rooij

Sarah Pichlkostner – K: "So darlin', darlin', stand by me, I just wanna stay in bed today" (2018)

Sarah Pichlkostner (b. Salzburg, Austria, 1988, lives and works in Vienna and London) makes installations, which she herself describes as ‘settings’, with the word referring to the individual atmosphere, to the experience. The artist wants to give viewers the opportunity to inhabit these settings with their own personal stories. The settings consist of different objects and installations that have been brought together as part of Pichlkostner’s investigation into the character of materials, how they behave in a specific space and how they appeal to our sensory perception. For Pichlkostner, the objects are more than form and dimension; she views them as characters, which she always refers to as KAY and KUY. KAY stands for reason and logic; KUY represents feeling.

So, for Pichlkostner, a work begins with a thorough exploration of the space and location. This is followed by the selection of materials that are the best fit for the surroundings. These are often readymade elements, which she dismantles and reassembles. They are DIY products, such as windows, lights, fabric, tubing and sandbags, which she buys cheaply from a builder’s merchant’s or which have been previously used. Pichlkostner believes that pre-used objects embody the stories of that former life.

For Hybrids, Pichlkostner choose the French pond at De Oude Warande, 30 metres by 60 metres. Her choice of this water feature was based on the fact that water was the first reflective material known to humankind. This also explains Pichlkostner’s fondness for reflective aluminium, which is used to make mirrors, and can be interpreted as a symbol of human self-reflection.

An invisible underwater construction supported thin horizontal and vertical tubes and square aluminium structures that stuck up out of the water. The artist specifically considered the conditions of this outdoor space, which are very different from the white cube, as ceiling and walls are absent and the floor is a constantly changing water surface. The structure of the setting created its own boundaries. The appearance of the light and the water changed all the time, influencing the perception of all the elements and altering the viewer’s experience, which effectively became fluid.