Weekly Conversations... with Christine Lederer
Weeekly Conversations with… presents Austrian artist Christine Lederer. She was born in Bludenz in 1976, graduated with a Degree in Communications Design (University of Applied Sciences) in Augsburg in 2004 and successfully completed her Study for M.A. under Prof. Olaf Metzel, Academy of Fine Arts Munich in 2014. She has had numerous Individual exhibitions, participated in Group exhibitions and has had many works as curator. She won the DAAD Prize for Outstanding Achievements by Foreign Students in 2013, as well as purchase by Federal State of Vorarlberg in the same year. She lives and works in Bludenz as independent graphic artist and freelance artist.
This is your first time staying at an Artist-in-residence program and you mentioned, that you are not working on a particular project during your stay at the studio das weisse haus. What is the goal of your stay and what do you hope to gain from it? Does the environment have an impact on your work?
First of all, it is really great to change the world and the surroundings I am living in, because normally I meet the same people and the same atmosphere at home. Therefore, it is really inspiring to interfere with new people and collect new inspirations at and from a different place. I am very opened about my time here, I have no particular plan because this year has been really busy for me and it is necessary for me now to calm down a bit and change my perspective. I wouldn’t have thought that I would meet so many inspiring people here so I am just letting myself be inspired by the exchanges with them and by the atmosphere.
Where do you mostly draw your inspiration from? Obviously, these interactions and also the surroundings have a great influence on you. Do you have any plans or ideas for your next project?
I am reading a book at the moment and there is this quote, I really like: your brain is round, so you can change your mind. I think, the atmosphere is really important for the feelings you have about your life and also about your work. Especially because I think I am a very emotional person, I often think about the small feelings and thinking about the people, coming together in my mind and creating my own world.
For me it is really good to have time to think about all these feelings I have mentioned and let something new come to me.
My last exhibition was about the refugee situation and I also worked with nature, with dried flowers and when a project is closed, I don’t know how to get to the next project. And I think this time is really important to get some new ideas, to stay open minded and try to be free. I always ask myself a lot of questions about how I should live as an artist, financially and also existentially. Questions like: Where is the interest in my artwork? What is the artist and what is the artwork for? I want to change something and I want to stay tough in these changing times. There is a lot of fear and waiting for change. What is our responsibility as artists? That is going to be a question of time for me. Because of my sensitivity, I feel I have a lot coming in, but what are my possibilities and facilities to let all this out and to show the world…
ARTIST’S STATEMENT
Words flow from my head via my tongue onto the paper, wood, wall.
As statements/challenges/provocations they merge into installations – surrounded by found objects which already have their lives behind them. Together they become conserved scraps of thought, captors of memories, narratives from the froth of internal emotions, fragments, the theatrical stage. The accompanying drawings are fragile, fleeting lines depicting the faces of life.