Cyrill Lachauer: I am not sea, I am not land

Cyrill Lachauer. I am not sea, I am not land is the first solo exhibition created especially for the former air raid shelter of Haus der Kunst—a nearly 300 m² space divided into cabinet-like sections constructed between 1933–1937 offering shelter to up to 300 people. In 2011 it was changed into an exhibition space and was subsequently used to present media works from The Sammlung Goetz in curated group shows. The exhibition by Cyrill Lachauer was commissioned by The Sammlung Goetz, which has extensive groups of works by the artist.

The result is the extensive multimedia installation Cockaigne – I am not sea, I am not land, which consists of films, videos, slide projections, sound installations, photographs, and wall texts. As this is an interconnected installation, the artist has included photographs and handwritten wall texts, which are presented on the walls of the connecting passageways between the cabinets.

The title Cockaigne refers to the 1567 painting by Pieter Bruegel the Elder, The Land of Cockaigne, a mythical land of plenty understood as a utopian-ironic alternative to the everyday harshness of rural life. In one of his films, Cyrill Lachauer zooms in on the painting in a 30-minute tracking shot. The film is accompanied by a spoken text written by the artist. Together with artist and musician Moritz Stumm, co-founder of the music label “Flipping the Coin Records,” Lachauer developed an accompanying soundtrack.

The point of departure for the project is the artist’s film Dodging Raindrops – A Separate Reality (2017), which is the only pre-existing work in the exhibition. The work is an episodic experimental film in which the artist tells of encounters with rappers, rodeo riders, and alleged Native Americans, and explores questions of identity and attribution as well as fiction. Lachauer thus combines documentary and staged scenes to create a mythic-apocalyptic narrative. It remains to be seen how much of his own history he has brought into the film as a white, European male and artist.

The artist, who was born in Rosenheim in 1979 and lives in Berlin, studied directing, ethnology and fine arts. In his youth, he came across the book A Separate Reality (1971) by Carlos Castaneda. It recounts the anthropologist’s fictional encounter with a Native American medicine man, who teaches Castaneda to “see.” Motivated by the idea of a narrative landscape in which the history of its inhabitants is also inscribed, Lachauer traveled to the United States. Setting out from Los Angeles, he followed Carlos Castaneda’s fictional field research route. Yet the story Lachauer tells is a different one.

The examination of the idea of land and landscape in their most varied manifestations constitutes the exhibition’s basic framework. Land, for example, can refer to homeland and thus provide roots, or it can be used to provide nourishment. It can, however, also foster a sense of inclusion or exclusion when it embodies the idea of nationhood.

On his journeys to Brazil, South Africa, the United States, and Romania, as well as to Berlin and the Province of Brandenburg, Lachauer encounters hobos, the migrant workers who travel across America on freight trains, a queer park worker in California’s Yosemite National Park, diamond miners in South Africa, and Barrit, who fled the United States and can no longer return to his homeland. They are the most varied of people, united in their position as marginalized members of society.

Curated by Cornelia Gockel and Susanne Touw, The Sammlung Goetz