KNOPP FERRO
PERFORMANCE-CONCEPT-STATEMENT BANGKOK

The subject of the performance is the artistic process of transformation: from the creation of a work of art to its
dissolution. The process by which art materializes and, with the help of transformation, dematerializes.
The stages of this performance are: Image - Orientation - Word - Action
 

Plans of Interrupture - About Knopp Ferro, Baits and Blow Torches

For no obvious reason, Josef K. was arrested one day. lf the intention would have been evident to him, K. would have done his best to prevent his own execution. lt wasn't.

What might have motivated Knopp Ferro to drag a heavy, loud rattling iron box through downtown New York, with complete unconcern for the puzzled looks of the bypassers ?

At the same time he is drafting 'plan' drawings in black ink, in which the course as strategical conception and the aesthetic of drawing coincide in the same item. Lines, small areas of color, characters imitating sounds, symbols, signs and sometimes even words or short passages, spin a fine net to catch the viewers eye in a maze of picture riddles. However, contrary to the principle of having to decipher the rhethorical images of a picture puzzle, the transported states of Knopp Ferro's mazes can be grasped optically, i.e. directly visuallised. As notes on a sheet of music, a crescendo unravels from these apparently abstract signs and lines, which seems to have an individual as well as an universal validity. And in the same way as a tune can create an invisible body of resonance, the artist's net of lines outlines a spherical magnetic field, which weaves the rhythm and space of life into the picture as energetic potential. When the undefined is fixed within an image, hidden forces are anticipated and reveaied. The transposition of their inherent creative and destructive energies inherent into three-dimensionality thus remains most consequent.

Knopp Ferro has literally welded some of his signs and messengers of rhythm and movement out of sheets of iron. In the 70's, the legendary artists group `Jet Ferro', founded by Knopp Ferro, used the transformation of everyday items into metal to show estrangement. Today, however, this transformation conveys a self-concious idea of the artistic elements and from time to time employs an actionistic grasp into space. In an extended idea of the dimensions, the 3 foot long, welded iron line seems to be derived from drawing, its appearance being light and etheral, and thus unifies concrete and abstract space. In doing so, it does not at all rigidify to iron-bound statics, but catalyses and directs the movement of the concrete enviroment. Knopp Ferro emphasises the evolution of the dynamical element in a most practial way by placing some of his objects on wheels, and or small vehicles. Various elements are suspended on fragile and extraordinary thin iron rods, left to float in free space like antennas. They are set into motion by the slightest current of air or a gentle touch as if being pulled by silken strings. A carefully tuned iron counterweight regulates the stabilty of the subsequent revebrations and one would not be astonished at all, if the wheels would start to move all by themselves.

In the same way Knopp Ferro's performance'die is cast'(Stadtmusem, Cologne 3/96) is motivated by this concept of subsequent progressions and the constant violation of exterior and interior limitations. Acoustic enticements act as counterparts to corresponding images appearring in the form of small `feelers' -made of wire and a drawing- which are distributed in the room. Videos, containing previous performances and drawings that have been filmed, are projected in full size on the wall, on which, at the same time, the artist affixes sculptural objects. Sounds and images of the past and the present intermingle until they lose their seperate identities. The performer's figure throws shadows on the wall with the projected images, while he himself becomes part of the screen. Synaesthetic'coincidencia'penetrates the room. lt is a baroque orgy of the senses, of tying and untying in which the elements seem to be involved in a secrete dialogue. With alternating tenses the media of expression changes, causing a constant fluxuation of space and the plane itself. The dissolution of linear structures enables new visions and constellations that express time as space and activity as a rule of passiveness.

Opposing principles, acting simultaniously, load the `feeler' objects with vigorous energy. The creature-like concrete items of abstraction crane their level heads- with the drawings on top into space, just as a butterfly pierced on a board. They seem to emerge from a space between spaces and evolve by the function of sending and receiving impulses; they always seem to be ready for take off into another reality. When landing they will spare no one and nothing and they choose to beseige neglected items of everyday life, romp on screens or nest in a niche of the wall.

Within the'bait'drawings the coinciding of different levels acts as an eye-catcher. Posing plain and insignificant, the delicate ink drawings sound the attack, attempting the viewers assassination. Without a sound temptation ropes down from nowhere and aims a lasso at its victim, leading him to the hidden fountains of incarnation.

This playfully subversive way of handling concrete items, that has been characteristic of objects made of iron in the 70's, has now reached a new level in the light-footed game of abstraction. Now the initial basis of the works is to create a world that lies beyond the picture and that reaches towards the world of items, incorporating them subject to its own laws. Handling the perspectives autonomously allows the intervention of subversion - a child's play.'

You only have to change the direction" said the cat to the mouse and bit its head off . You only have to visualise the vibrations when they approach for landing, said Knopp Ferro to Josef K. and winked an eye with the flendish grin of a rogue, whose shoe constanly pinches to dance against the current.

With golden slippers he sits on an ice floe and marvels at that the freezing surfaces growing together - to- just in case- help with a blow torch.

Uli Seegers, January 1997

Translated by Silke Thomas


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