Do You Hear What I Hear? Do You See What I See?

Since being exhibited at the dOCUMENTA (13) in 2012, István Csákány is seen as one of the most important young Hungarian artists. He created the works leading up to the installation Ghost Keeping that was shown there while he was an artist in residence at the Krinzinger programme in Petömihalyfa, Hungary in 2011. In his first solo exhibition at the Galerie Krinzinger he is now presenting new pieces that he has incorporated in a large-scale spatial transformation.

In his work, Csakany attempts to reinterpret the notion of sculpture and to also expand it by creating enormous installations. These more recent instinctive, poetic installations are laden with dark nuances and abstruse features. The strategy of appropriating objects as in Ghost Keeping is comprised and expanded in the newer pieces. Equally decisive for his oeuvre is the theme of work, workers (in a social sense) in conjunction with the artist and his artistic career. In his exhibition in the ground-floor gallery in Vienna, he transforms the exhibition space into a space of perception. The space that is covered with a white carpet so as to absorb almost every sound strongly resembles old office spaces. The windows that have been rearranged and covered with curtains are illuminated in burning light. As Csákány remarks: “The neon installation for me is like an opening to another, optional space. The light and the curtain illuminate, shroud and open up the exhibition space.”

The space that has been transformed through the enormous luminosity of the light and the uniform white floor into a sterile space accommodates two sculptures (or better: a sculpture and a model of a sculpture) to which woodcuts have been added. The Concrete Wreath sculpture paraphrases Bruce Nauman as a huge wreath for a grave. As such it becomes a heraldic emblem that becomes laden with allegories through the vulgar gesture. The model of an ivy stem alludes to a monumental ivy piece from the diorama exhibition. And the motif of a woodcut is an adaptation of an archival shot. One can see a world war soldier with a device resembling a receiver used for eavesdropping. The situation and the setting have been altered in the woodcut, with the artist acting as the main figure holding the eavesdropping device. The receiver stands symbolically for the desire to want or to have to intensify sensory experiences. At the same time the simplicity of the construction makes this desire for total attention become increasingly absurd. Like the previous Diorama exhibition, these pieces, too, address the phenomenon of observing and being observed, the sense of there still being something invisible behind what lies behind.