November 23 - December 1, 2019
Andrea Büttner
What is so terrible about craft?
Kunstverein München
With What is so terrible about craft?, Kunstverein München presents a new film production by Andrea Büttner. Her work is concerned with the relationship between intimate artistic production and public exposure, as well as the interrelation between ethics and aesthetics. In her practice, which comprises woodcut, installation, painting, photography, sculpture and video, the artist explores conceptions of shame, religion, poverty and craft.
The exhibition is centered around Büttner's new video work What is so terrible about craft? / Die Produkte der menschlichen Hand [Products of the human hand], which will be presented in the main space of Kunstverein München. The double projection is composed of interior shots of a chain for household goods, which are juxtaposed with scenes from an ecclesiastical environment. In her film, the artist looks at how Western European traditions of craft have been infused with models of life and ways of being. Büttner questions whom these models are serving and how craft is deployed to "heal the wounds of modernity." The film considers craft's ongoing relation to reactionary political movements, as well as its role in national narratives and religious identity formation.
Image: Andrea Büttner, Videostill: What is so terrible about craft? / Die Produkte der menschlichen Hand, 2019, two-channel-video, sound, 32:00 min, Courtesy the artist ; Hollybush Gardens, London; David Kordansky Gallery, Los Angeles; Galerie Tschudi, Zuoz, © Andrea Büttner / VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2019.