"Landschaftsporträt IV"

C-print on Dibond

Beyond the principle of nature
A boulder rests in a high landscape, but it is said to fly. Markus Guschelbauer has built him a paraglider that is inflated by the wind. Fliegen (2008) vividly demonstrates that his works are characterised by a poetic-sensual approach to the visual arts. Through his choice of motifs, Markus Guschelbauer's works are often characterised as a game, as an examination of nature and culture. This is coherent in that they question the dichotomy of these two concepts, which are charged with cultural history. The very choice of the medium of photography, the photographic perspective, by definition implies that an 'artificial' view is directed at 'nature'. In nuce this can already be seen in an early work, in Waldporträt I from 2007. In the approach typical of his works, Markus Guschelbauer directs his analogue camera at nature, which he then manipulates for the photo with often simple technical means. In Waldporträt I, a kind of shop window into nature is created by framing it with fabric on the left and right edges of the picture, in which the artist's fixed gaze literally imposes the perspective. The use of foils and fabrics is typical of Markus Guschelbauer's works as an intervention in natural space. But he also uses mirrors, as in Waldporträt II (2007) or in Über das Verhältnis vom rechten Winkel zur Natur, I-IV (2007). For the latter series he used large-format groups of mirrors, which are placed apparently en passant in the landscape, bending the view of nature and thus creating a picture within a picture, a landscape within a landscape. But even without the use of mirrors Markus Guschelbauer playfully doubles the view by hiding the 'natural' landscape with 'artificial' elements. Elements that make the artistic work appear as landscape and soil cultivation and thus question the classical concept of work in natural areas, such as agriculture. However, the artistic work does not aim at transfiguring natural landscapes or at transfiguring their treatment. On the contrary, Markus Guschelbauer's work creates new spaces, new landscapes.
For although many of his works show transparencies made of transparent plastic or fabric, the natural space itself is the foil for an examination of questions beyond the 'principle of nature', for example the development of spaces of possibility. In Waldraum I (2011), for example, he places a space limited by films directly in a forest. Plastic Nature (2011) can be understood as a counterpoint to this, in which the photo shows the interior view of a space limited on all sides by plastic film. At first glance, tree trunks form the exhibition objects in this white cube in and for nature. In the background, outside the space delimited by the film, but inside the space delimited by the camera, a greenish incidence of light can be seen, which refers to a - possibly natural - outside of the film space, but which only becomes recognisable and possible through the constitutive inside. By pointing it is simultaneously hidden. A theme that returns in reverse form in the tree works - Cherry Blossom (2008), Wind Break (2010), Apple Tree (2011). Formally individualised 'natural artefacts' are shown in a stage-like staging, the 'natural' environment is faded out. In Lawn I (2007), too, part of a meadow appears in front of the curtain. In addition to the analogy of the title to Dürer's famous watercolour, there is also a certain similarity of the picture to Dürer's icon, whereby the effect in Markus Guschelbauer's work is due solely to the use of foil. In Lawn Piece II from 2008, the focus is no longer only on the grass that is generally visible, but also on the earth in which it grew. One of the most visually irritating works by Markus Guschelbauer is his confrontation with water. In Schwimmen (2008) a rock wrapped in foil protrudes from the water, in Perforated Water I (2009) Markus Guschelbauer hollows out the surface of the water, placing a blank space in the otherwise mirror-smooth surface. In Wildbach ohne Titel (2011), the border between nature and culture mentioned at the beginning of this article becomes completely blurred. At first glance, one thinks one is looking at an idyllic waterfall scene. Only at second glance does this idyll turn out to be manufactured - by covering the stones with transparent foil. The result is a composition of water and foil as an impressive and at the same time deceptive harmony. These subtle means stand for a constant in Markus Guschelbauer's works: the break with and the irritation of pictorial worlds known from the observation of nature. The opening of broad spaces of association and questioning is always accompanied by poetics and sensuality.
(Alexander Fleischmann, from: Markus Guschelbauer (eds.), Markus Guschelbauer, Eigenverlag 2012, p. 19)