SAILSTORFER -PERROTIN
Interview of Michael SAILSTORFER by Philippe Joppin, July 2013.
Philippe Joppin: In the past you have been doing several series of sculptures but in the last shows I have seen a lot of paintings. How did you get into this process?
Michael Sailstorfer: I started the series of “Mazes” paintings in 2009 and did show them for the first time in 2012. In 2009, after many thoughts and doubts, I decided to make this shift to painting as it was a natural process and next step in my practice…the idea came and as an artist I don’t want to be limited by a medium or material to use. First is the Idea, second the choice of material…That’s how I usually start to work and that’s why
there is a big diversity in my practice and every piece or series of pieces looks different and starts with new problems, doubts and decisions to take. This process is illustrated in the “Mazes”. All the, “Yes” and “No”, “Rights” vand “Lefts”, “Ups” and “Downs”, good and bad decisions are visible on the surface and make the artwork.
With this new series I also have the feeling that your references are moving from the German cultural scene to the American Pop Culture?
In the latest “Mazes” there is a direct reference to Andy Warhol’s oxidation paintings. For the canvases I use a primer with copper or other metallic pigments before the maze structure is screen printed onto them. By spraying acid on the canvas or pissing on the surface I try to find the way through the maze, what makes the primed surface oxidate…
In the “Mazes” series you are collecting images from Internet while you are usually playing with the nature and the way the artist could turn itinto another reality. it is also something that interests you with these web references or it is more the gesture and the infinite possibilities of the medium that interest you?
Almost every new piece starts with an online research. When I started to do the “Mazes” I looked for templates and found thousands in the web. There are online maze-generators, web-sites for children and pastime. It was the easiest way to get the material and as an infinite resource. But I also like the idea of transforming random and infinite possibilities by right and wrong decisions into a unique piece of art.
For the show at the gallery you are also working with the iconic Statue of Liberty. Is there a relation with the fact that Bartholdi was a French Sculptor or it just come out from the idea to change this iconic image as you are doing with the Warhol piss paintings?
On my way from Berlin to the countryside in Brandenburg I stopped at a place that sells second hand construction materials. They had this 2,5m tall aluminum cast of the Sculpture of Liberty in their garden next to fragments of soviet monuments, old bathtubs and parts of the Berlin wall. I decided to buy the sculpture and had it in my studio for quite some time…
Planning my show for Galerie Perrotin in Paris I decided to show it there, as the real sculpture was a French present. I liked the idea to take it literally and use the sculpure as a big drill to perforate the gallery walls. I think the idea was not to change the iconic image but to see what this iconic image or the word ‘Freedom’ can be used for and what connections could be made.