Vom Baden lernen
December 15, 2022–February 27, 2023
Venue: Public space, hot springs, Ennetbaden
Address: Badstrasse 30, 5408 Ennetbaden, Switzerland
Alfredo Jaar’s neon installation between the hot springs and the Limmat River addresses the profound processes of change in the spa town.
As part of the exhibition cycle Vom Baden lernen, curators Isabelle Meiffert and Mirko Winkel invited the exceptional artist to exhibit in the public space in proximity to the 21 hot thermal springs in Baden and Ennetbaden, Switzerland. Already used by the Romans and until modern times, they lost their importance in the 20th century. In 2021, on the initiative of the local population, several pools were built on both sides of the river, into which the 47°C hot spring water flows permanently. They are open to the public free of charge and have established a completely new bathing practice, although it follows a specific local tradition that has been practiced in open public baths for many centuries.
Jaar often works site-specifically, engaging with both local and global social issues. The neon installation Be Afraid of the Enormity of the Possible is a quote from Romanian philosopher Emil Cioran. The artist and the curators have selected it for this particular site because it celebrates the possibilities of social change. It can be related to the many bathing projects recently realized, as well as to unpredictable developments yet to come.
Isabelle Meiffert and Mirko Winkel take a critical look at the exemplary history of transformation in Baden with their exhibition cycle Vom Baden lernen (Learning from bathing/Baden). Other site-specific contributions came from Armen Avanessian, Sabian Baumann, Corinn Gerber, bagno popolare, Philipp Furtenbach, Valentin Groebner, Bianca Kennedy, Fabian Knecht, Susanne Lorenz, Andrea Schaer, studio arpha, Sarah Wiederkehr, FupaMagic, Andrea Schaer, Marie Laing, TJ Cuthand, Leslie Philbert, Nathalie Specker, Edwin Ramirez, Simon Noah Harder, and others.
Alfredo Jaar is an artist, architect, and filmmaker who lives and works in New York. His work has been widely exhibited around the world. He thas participated in the Biennales of Venice, São Paulo, and the documenta in Kassel. He has realized more than seventy public interventions around the world. More than sixty monographic publications have been published about his work. He was a Guggenheim Fellow in 1985 and a MacArthur Fellow in 2000. He received the Hiroshima Art Prize in 2018 and the Hasselblad Award in 2020.
Isabelle Meiffert is based in Berlin, where she works as a freelance curator and organizes international exhibitions in institutions and public spaces. She is interested in transcending the structures of the white cube and impacting society by experimenting with different media and formats. Mirko Winkel is based in Switzerland and coordinates a unique artistic laboratory at the Institute of Geography at the University of Bern, specializing in new forms of knowledge exchange. The spectrum of his research-based and context-sensitive work includes performances, videos, lectures, conversational formats and proposals for improvement. As curators, Isabelle Meiffert and Mirko Winkel pursue a fundamentally transdisciplinary approach, bringing artistic positions into dialogue with those of scientists, politicians, the general public and other professionals. Since 2019, they have been working together in the working group Art in the Underground of the nGbK Berlin, which organizes an international competition for art in public space in Berlin.
The project Bäderkultur Baden of the Bäderverein is supported by: Bundesamt für Kultur BAK, Kanton Aargau, Swisslos Kanton Aargau, Stadt Baden, Gemeinde Ennetbaden; selected by Regionale 2025 Projektschau Limmattal; Vom Baden lernen is supported by: Pro Helvetia, UBS Kulturstiftung, Ernst Göhner Stiftung, Ernst und Olga Gubler-Hablützel Stiftung.
