National Glass Centre

Well, between Jenny's last post and now, a lot has happened - this is the second month of the exhibition (my how time flies!) and we've been busy giving talks, tours, and answering the questions of visitors as they walk around the gallery. 

Because the painted walls (Lothar Goetz's House of Rainer Werner Fassbinder) are actually a part of the exhibition, there are no text labels attached anywhere in the gallery.  Instead we have two handouts available: a floor plan of the gallery, with each work numbered and described accordingly; and a listing of all the participating artists giving biographical information and further description of their practice.  Many visitors seem to prefer asking us directly about the works, however, which is wonderful because we have a lot of stories to share from our installation experiences!  Many of the works in Re-make/Re-model were commissioned by the NGC, and as such were assembled on-site.  This is one of the reasons we were able to work so closely with some of the artists involved, and I must say it's very satisfying to be able to tell someone that you have helped to assemble the work they are admiring.  Meeting so many of the artists was great as well; existing works solicited for exhibitions are often shipped in from the artist's studio or representative gallery, and conversations with the curatorial staff take place by e-mail or telephone.  This exhibition is special for having had so many artists come and give it a personal touch. 

In my case, I helped Christian Graser with his works Re-Mikado and The Hour Glass - I soaked and scrubbed many of the glass beer bottles for The Hour Glass after carting them upstairs from the restaurant.  Then while Christian carefully assembled his sculpture one bottle at a time, a group of us set to work rolling individual 'sticks' out of old NGC promotional material for Re-Mikado... yes, there are 41 of them, just like a real game!  It was not as easy as it looked at first glance, either.  We had to make them very slender in the middle while still being strong enough to hang from the ceiling without bending.

The exhibition is on until the 27th of February next year, so there is still plenty of time to come by and see it for yourself - please come in and let us know what you think!