The Vibration of Things

The 15th edition of the Triennial of Small Sculpture Fellbach opened on June 4, 2022 and brings together over 50 artistic positions. Under the title The Vibration of Things, curator Elke aus dem Moore raises fundamental questions of our present—questions that are central to our coexistence on this planet. Starting from a vitality of matter and thus also an effective power of objects, artistic positions are presented that deal with socially highly topical questions of ownership, interconnectedness, restitution and responsibility. The Triennial addresses these questions in a narrative parcours in the Alte Kelter, the traditional exhibition venue of the Triennial, as well as in a forest piece and in a digital exhibition space. 

From the beginning, the Triennial was developed in close collaboration with Memory Biwa, Antje Majewski and Gabriel Rossell Santillán. As co-curators, they have developed their own contributions to the Triennial and invited artists to participate. 

Memory Biwa invited Elisia Nghidishange, Philisa Zibi, Thania Petersen, Vitjitua Ndjiharine and Stephané Edith Conradie. Biwa’s curatorial project is dedicated to the charge and loading of objects, which can change and even disappear, especially against the backdrop of forced migration of objects, through war, robbery or other acts of violence. How do losses of objects affect people, entire communities? Can the charge of objects, their energy, be extinguished? Are there possibilities for reactivation? Are there echoes between different times and places?

Antje Majewski’s project also touches the core of the Triennial’s questions and offers a concrete solution with performative power. For Sculpture Forest Sanctuary she has invited Paweł Althamer, Agnieszka Brzeżańska, Alioune Diouf, Cecilia Edefalk, Gregor Prugger, Paulina Kondraskov and Paweł Freisler. Together they deal with the topic of ownership of life. Majewski explores the possibility, or rather impossibility, of owning such a multi-dimensional, multi-faceted multiplicity as a forest and trimming it down to one’s own interests. Connected to the installation of the figures in the forest is an agreement that has legal consequences and spiritual significance: The forest may no longer be instrumentalised, used as a resource or even entered by humans.

Gabriel Rossell Santillán’s project resonates between different times and cultures around the Pacific. He invites us to a time when the Pacific was considered the centre of the earth. The starting point of this journey is a tapestry made in the years 1585 -1590 in northern India, near the region of Fatehpur Sikri. What is unusual about this carpet is the many different artistic styles, which refer to different cultural traditions from all over the Pacific region. Today, elements of this carpet are missing. With Lizza May David, Keiko Kimoto, Karen Michelsen-Castañón, Antonio Paucar and Luis Ortiz, artists from the Pacific region (Japan, Philippines, Colombia, Peru, Mexico), Gabriel Rossell Santillán has dedicated himself to working out the missing parts of the carpet. The newly created carpet works Flowers beneath our feet speak of colonialist relations of exploitation, of the destruction and desacralisation of important spiritual places through industrial use and privatisation, but also of the displacement of indigenous knowledge. 

Resonances
The exhibition is accompanied by an extensive programme of events. The three-part series Resonances—Listening to Things More Often was developed by Nikola Hartl and shows different perspectives on the topics in film screenings, talks and performances. #1 Resonances  will address the topics of Reparation and Restitution. #2 Resonances Property and legality are at stake in conversations and interventions with Brenna Bhandar, Irene Schöne, Antje Majewski, a.o..

Parallel exhibition 
The work of the Colombian artist Nijolė Šivickas, born in 1925, who represents an essential artistic position in the Triennial, will be presented parallel to the Triennial in a solo exhibition at the Galerie der Stadt Fellbach from 9 June to 4 September. Born in Lithuania, she studied at the State Academy of Fine Arts in Stuttgart from 1946 to 1950. Šivickas lived in Colombia from the 1950s until her death in 2018.

Collaborations
ifa Gallery Stuttgart will presents the multidisciplinary sound duo Pungwe—Memory Biwa and Robert “Chi” Machiri (September 22–24), titled When gathering ruins through ceremony, objects become songs. Artist Chiara Bugatti invited the choreographer Alessandro Giaquinto for the dance study Rehearsing brutality until it is totally destroyed with dancers from the Stuttgart Ballet on June 22 and September 27 in the Alte Kelter. 

Catalogue
The catalogue The Vibration of Things brings together artistic, literary and theoretical texts by Elke aus dem Moore, Memory Biwa, Antje Majewski, Paz Guevara, Jane Bennett, Ailton Krenak, Hervé Yamguen, Robin Wall Kimmerer, Sharon Dodua Otoo, Amogelang Maledu, Laura Ganda, Mara Johanna Kölmel and Marie T. Martin, among others. The catalogue is by Archive Books. 

Curator: Elke aus dem Moore in collaboration with Memory Biwa, Antje Majewski and Gabriel Rossell Santillán. Assistance Curator: Jandra Boettger, Nikola Hartl, Sarie Nijboer

Further information
City of Fellbach—Cultural Office, Hintere Straße 16, 70734 Fellbach
T 0711 5851 364 / kulturamt [​at​] fellbach.d

Press contact
Markus Müller, T +49 30 20188432 / mm [​at​] bureaumueller.com
BUREAU MUELLER, Knaackstr. 71, 10435 Berlin