KILIAN RÜTHEMANN

9 - 16 June 2024 | Mathis-Hof, Basel, CH

For Basel Social Club 2024, Galerie Fabian Lang and Kilian Rüthemann propose a sculptural intervention titled Makeshift. Alone on a field you are greeted by the soft and playful dance of color and light reflecting off the hi-tech fabric of a majestic ring-tower. The reflective fabrics – more commonly used on safety jackets – are soft vessels filled with sand. This particular sandbag building technique stands as a unit of construction originally developed for displaced people. Sand is almost liquid and shapeless when it's loose but becomes hard like concrete when stuffed and compressed in a limited space. Appearing near bursting-point, the earthquake-proof construction has a precarious, wobbly look, while the play of prism-light on the surface attracts us almost magnetically and tempts us to touch it or overthrow it. Rüthemann works with everyday familiar materials: sugar, salt or building materials such as cement, plaster, concrete, iron or asphalt. In their formal simplicity, the works of the trained sculptor reveal a comprehensive knowledge of the source materials, whose properties and potentials Rüthemann explores.

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