Sense of Place: ÜBERGRAD
Exhibition “sense of Place”: The 39 artists in this exhibition explore how space becomes place when it is imbued with meaning, and how place and identity are inextricably bound to one another. Through their work we can see how we come to identify with where we live. In turn, we are shaped by these places, creating environmental autobiographies.
At first glance, those plaster and concrete compositions bring to mind the Soviet architecture I discovered on a trip to war-torn Abkhazie, in the wake of the collapse of the Soviet Union. This succession of buildings, of high-rises and alleyways, and of block-like units with symmetrically aligned windows unite to form neighborhoods that spring up out of nowhere.
Devoid of all human traces lest it be the enigmatic light being shed, it is the very essence of a city that comes across, beyond history. These are places imbued with solitude, where the light serves to remind us of a presence that we, unflaggingly if unavailingly, continue to seek out.