FREIHEIT

Opening of the exhibition of German artist Mariella Kerscher. In collaboration with Gallery XY.
free entry

The opening of Mariella Kerscher's exhibition Nourished will take place:

17.30 p.m. Deniska Showcase, Denisova 5, Olomouc (open 24 hours)
18.00 p.m. Gallery XY, Dolní náměstí 23/42, Olomouc (open Monday 13 p.m.–19 p.m., Tuesday-Sunday 9 a.m.–19 p.m.)

The exhibition will run until 20 June 2024.

How can we understand mortality? Where is the origin? Which iconographic codes and vanitas still life symbols remain anchored in the collective memory? And what can a contemporary still life by a female artist look like when women are supposedly on the verge of equality and patriarchy is crumbling?

Placental blood, resin, honey, water, breast milk, ocean salt water, sepia ink… What nourishes us? At birth, we are dependent on nourishing fluids in both direct form (mother’s milk) and indirect form (from intact, nourished and interconnected ecosystems). The collected “essential fluids” come from nature and from humans and animals. As a heterogeneous mixture, they partially combine and develop their structures under the surface. The structures can only be roughly preserved; their components (the organic liquids) continue to change slowly with time and incident sunlight. In various series, different formulations of these liquids are tested, microscoped and collected on microscope slides. The focus is on the various properties, such as feeding, growing or healing wounds. Fragments of different ecosystems and habitats in the sea, inland waters and on land are combined.

Mariella Kerscher (1991) graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich in 2016. So far she has exhibited mainly in Germany and Austria, her works have been presented at Galerie Probst in Berlin, Galerie der Künstler:inner in Munich, xpon-art gallery in Hamburg, in Parallel Vienna and other institutions. She has also received many scholarship grants (cities of Augsburg and Munich, Neustart Kultur of Stiftung Kunstfonds, Werksviertel-Mitte, etc.).
Mariella Kerscher’s artistic work is concerned with providing access to the often taboo matter of natural transience. She works with symbols of collective memory (wilting flowers, dilapidated houses) and deals with attributes of birth and death that are still unfamiliar, such as the placenta. Mariella Kerscher collects and dissects organic elements in order to preserve them in her works. The fragments are replicated and combined to create ornamental structures, forming an infinite cycle: growth, mutation, death, growth.