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PostWar & Contemporary
3490* ANDREAS SLOMINSKI(Meppen 1959 - lives and works in Berlin
and Hamburg)
Untitled (wind mill).
Wood, metal and tape.
111 x 111 x 47.5 cm.
Provenance:
- Galerie Linding in Paludetto, Nurnberg.
- Purchased from the above by the pre-
sent owner in 1999, since then private
collection Italy.
Andreas Slominski is one of the most
unusual conceptual artist within Contem-
porary Art in Germany.
Born in Meppen in 1959, Slominski drop-
ped out of his philosophy studies in order
to attend the Hochschule für Bildende
Künste in Hamburg between 1983 and
1986. After a professorship in Karlsruhe,
he returned to the Hochschule in Ham-
burg in 2004 as successor to Franz Erhard
Walther. Alongside numerous solo and
group shows, he took part in the Venice
Biennale in 1997. In addition, Slominski
has been honoured with numerous prizes,
such as the Karl-Ströher prize, the Edwin-
Scharff prize and the Lichtwark prize.
He became famous for his animal traps
– which in the 1990s were still small
sculptures, but then became full room in-
stallations. Functioning animal traps, which
Slominski built from numerous individual
pieces, adorned with ironic or ambiguous
details, repeatedly confronting the viewer
with the question as to whether these
were really animal traps, whether they
were functioning, and what would happen
if one were to get inside such a thing. He
has succeeded in making an artwork out of
an object which has absolutely nothing to
do with art. On the one hand this occurs by
consciously placing the piece in a museum
or gallery space, on the other hand, how-
ever, he causes the viewer to regard his
traps within the context of art. He “ … plays
with our expectations of seriousness in
the works, which we believe we have found
in these ‘hallowed spaces’.” (cit. Collier
Schorr, in: Exh. Cat. Deutsche Guggen-
heim Berlin. Andreas Slominski, 20 Feb – 9
May 1999, p. 25).
Also in terms of motifs, he plays with our
expectations, in that his sculptures depict
utilitarian objects or everyday items and
we at first sight immediately think of
Marcel Duchamp’s Ready-mades and the
objet trouvé, which these, however, are
not. With unbelievable attention to detail
and manual skill, Slominski builds these
objects himself.
Slominski seduces with the humour and
lightness of his work, yet never loses his
unbelievable astuteness. Thus his works
are never just humorous, but also always
profound. This is demonstrated quite
impressively with his windmills, one of
which we are offering here at auction. As
Collier Schorr explains: “The deliberately
outmoded aesthetic of many of his animal
traps and windmill installations (….) convey
a feeling of a past time, an apparently
unspoilt era, when life was less complica-
ted. This is the myth, which Slominski uses
to lure us, and thereby to demonstrate the
dangers hidden in blind nostalgia.” (ibid, p.
15). Indeed we associate windmills, which
are an established part of his oeuvre, with
a rural, peaceful life, which compared with
the present era of the urbane, and rapid
technological advances, seems to be
disappearing more and more.
CHF 15 000 / 25 000
(€ 13 890 / 23 150)