Paweł Althamer

(Poland) *1967 in Warsaw

Paweł Althamer augments his sculptural work through performances and happenings. By frequently involving outsiders, he blurs the boundaries between individual and collective, artist and private person, breaks down institutional structures and opens up speculative spaces. Althamer also uses outer space, which has preoccupied him since the 1990s, as a projection surface for his mind games. For the sculpture group “Astronauts”, he modelled three reclining figures that appear to be wearing spacesuits. They are made to seem alien by strange details such as bulky glasses or curious headgear, for these are based on items of clothing from a Warsaw flea market. The posture of the figures references the painting “Land of Cockaigne” (1567) by Pieter Bruegel. While Althamer himself had already walked through the art exhibition at the 1997 documenta as an “astronaut”, thus thematizing his outsider status, here he creates a surreal juxtaposition of a technologically-based belief in progress with the old-masterly idyll of encamping in the park and of the undefined mass of bodies.
Paweł Althamer studied at the Warsaw Academy of Fine Arts. Since then, he has presented his work internationally, including at documenta 1997 and Skulptur Projekte Münster 2007.