Introduction

Esther Schipper is pleased to announce Objektwahl, a special presentation with works by Annette Kelm whose representation was announced in January. On view will be seven photographic works.   

A small introduction to Kelm's expansive and varied oeuvre, Objektwahl includes works created between 2017 and 2024. Four works from the artist‘s small series Jeans Buttons are installed in a grid, emphasizing the works‘ serial quality. Depicting the same section of a blue Jeans Jacket, each work features a different constellation of statement buttons attached to the front of the garment. From single "International Women’s Day, 8 March 1975" or "Have a Gay Day" to a cacophony of political causes from distinct time periods, Jeans Buttons bring to mind the importance of activist gestures in everyday life. The works emphasize the political struggles in lived experience, both as a reference to the fluctuating popularity and the often only episodic progress in advancing political causes but also as a hopeful gesture of continued belief in the possibility of change.

Still-life with Spring is another characteristic example of Kelm's idiosyncratic subject matter, bringing together inexpensive design objects, both mass produced and crafted, and a bouquet of flowers, all posed before bright blue surfaces. A small coil is seen perched on the table: the „spring“ in the work‘s title adds a visual pun and in its recognition, a moment of levity. Behind the economical conjuring of a colorful, yet also unexpectedly meaningful, motif lurks a sense of today's living conditions, a cobbled together scene that speaks to the conditions of modern living in a world of inexpensive design and found objects.  

Good Morning and Cola Meise both find beauty and serendipitous humor in everyday objects. The most recent work in this presentation, Cola Meise depicts an empty Coca-Cola bottle with a stopper in the shape of a surprisingly life-like wooden bird against a bright red background that has slight creases creating darker folds. Awash in red, the work has a playful quality but also approaches near abstraction with its expanse of color. (It recalls Joseph Albers's famous dictum about the subjectivity of color, in effect saying: everyone sees their own Coca-Cola red.) Good Morning takes as point of departure an unfolded napkin, placing small plastic flowers on and around the item, echoing its repeated, gridded floral motif, and pinning it to board. A dusty black cable cuts across the seeming sweetness of the subject matter: the electrical cord belongs to the flashlights used for the shoot. The self-referential gesture is at the core of Kelm’s practice whose works are always infused with a deep knowledge of and reflection on the medium of photography and its history.