Axel Loytved
OLD CONTEMPORARIES
Opening, October 25th , 6 p.m.
26. October – 24. November
Axel Loytved has an effectively succinct (lapidar) way of working. Like throwing a stone (lapis) into a pond:
A subtle movement from the shoulder, a short splash, circular ripples, the stone has sunk.
Now you can pick up another stone, or leave it alone.
Axel Loytved is constantly picking up more stones. He spin-dries scrap paper in the laundromat, turns packaging into bronze sculptures, creates prints from a container of fries and, while he waits for the scrap paper wash, cuts a carpet into strips and collects snow from car tires to be later used as sculptures.
A crucial factor for all of these activities is that the objects involved are ones that he comes across spontaneously. Axel Loytved doesn’t work from a premeditated concept that, through research and a desire to further one’s knowledge, leads to a desired result, but rather relies on each object’s own significance and inherent capacity to be given meaning when cleverly combined with other objects, a meaning that could not have been predicted in advance.
This means having to tolerate this succinct way of working. He has to put up with promising ideas going up in smoke or visually attractive objects that words cannot do justice. It is also difficult to control what happens and, above all, to repeat the same process – even if it is performed under the exact same conditions.
“The world is all that is the case,” wrote Wittgenstein, and this can be expanded to read: “Anyone can look around aimlessly – finding is what matters.”
(Translation: Matthew Way)