MQ Artist-in-Residence Genc Kadriu: I scare them martyred between cloud and soil

MQ Artist-in-Residence Genc Kadriu: I scare them martyred between cloud and soil
Opening: Wed 24.01.2023, 18h
25.01. – 25.02.2024, MQ Pop-Up Schauraum

Genc Kardriu (KS/GB) is a contemporary artist who lives and works in Prishtina and Tirana. Kadriu's art strives to visualize the interrelation and tension between one's inner experience and the outside world. Using tangible and symbolic objects and aspects from material culture, collective spiritual heritage, natural history, literature, spirituality and personal memorabilia, Kadriu's works are created through the poetic, museum-like arrangement of things in the form of sculptural arrangements and spatial installations. Through interdisciplinary research and applied experimentation, his practice follows a dialectic of opposites, interdependence and a logic of interaction between chance and intentionality.

I scare them martyred between cloud and soil
“There exists an opinion that the mask could be the first human work of art. This mask is a combination of material objects with backstories, yet there is something over and above all its components that makes it monstrous and affective. In many primitive traditions a spiritual feeling is imbued into a mask by its carver whereas the wearer is transformed by the mask into the thing the mask represents. This is usually a deity, or a spiritual entity, or a mythical creature. Playing the role of a bridging mediator between two entities, yet occupying a space that’s neither nor, the mask is not just like any other piece of sculpture, it’s a magic thing. The fictional mask which I brought from Kosovo, not unlike the style of a colonial collector, mimics a tribal mask. However, this exhibition is a preparatory sketch, I like to think of it as a trial version of a larger piece. Made of beeswax, lignite and minerals, with Kosovo’s historic backstory, implying modernist progress, habitat pollution, neoliberal exploitation, nationalist weaponization, territory and identity, among its material-sensory qualities, the mask also comprises two other elements, the actual hay from a wild plant meadow that’s been cultivated by the Austrian artist, Anita Fuchs, as part of her artistic-performative action on the grounds of MuseumsQuartier, and her hand-collected seeds from the biodiverse flora of the border region between Austria, Slovenia and Hungary.
The mask connects, invokes and weaves an interlace of relations over a number of layers. The masquerader comes out to appease the gods, and to talk to the town about what is good, or bad, about politics and the social situation”. (artist´s statement)

I scare them martyred between cloud and soil is an artistic work by Genc Kadriu, created in the frame of the AiR program “Art and Ecology” of MuseumsQuartier Wien and in information exchange and collaboration with Anita Fuchs´ project Versuchsfeld1 – a meadow on the territory of MuseumsQuartier Wien.

On the same evening, Speedshow Series S1E2 at Schauraum Angewandte andeSeL ABC feat. Grenzfurthner / monochrom at eSeL REZEPTION also take place at the MQ showrooms.