'Studio Project' Series

Last June, while on a work-cation in Vienna, I found myself strolling through Innere Stadt (Austria), aimlessly window shopping. Then I saw it: an image of plastic chairs—the kind from neighborhood block parties I grew up seeing everywhere. It stopped me in my tracks. I literally backpedaled and stepped into the gallery. That’s where I met Peter Garmusch. His passion for his ‘Studio Project’ series was infectious, the kind that stays with you long after the conversation ends. Back home in the States, I couldn’t shake it and reached out to keep the dialogue going. In things most people overlook. From monoblock chairs in Dakar to custom car wraps in Cairo, his work captures raw beauty hiding in plain sight.

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Kyle Mckenzie(KM): Your 'Studio Project' series emerges from an immersive approach, living in studio apartments in unfamiliar cities. How does this affect your perspective and connection to the mundane materials, like trash that translate into your works?

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Peter Garmusch (PG): I am fascinated and drawn to the unknown, the foreign, the magical energy of objects in combination - apart from a general attribution. Spending time in far away places and therefore displacement in my case is a stimulus for my awareness and fosters my creativity. Maybe I am driven by a certain emotional state of melancholic or nostalgic longing in far away places for something not present. It is a recollection of feelings, experiences, or events, that - being abroad - cause a sense of separation. I find everyday objects are the perfect placeholders for that.

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It’s a very silent and satisfying feeling of revelation for me when I encounter such qualities in strolling around foreign streets. I love to find a synthesis in everyday objects by committing to the integrity of the observed moment and expressing my own set of priorities to the real. 

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KM: Your work challenges viewers to find beauty and meaning in the overlooked corners of urban environments. What has been the most surprising or profound response from someone encountering your art?

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PG: What stands out the most is the subjectivity of the interpretation of the viewers. Some see just romantics, beauty or disgust. Others have completely different associations, more of, “it reminds me of" stuff. That is what makes me very happy. To have a visual consolidation in the work which can be a lot of different things able to raise different emotions within the viewers.

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KM:The Freudian concept of 'tabula rasa'—approaching environments without preconceptions—plays a big role in your approach. Can you describe a moment when objects like "trash" revealed its unexpected beauty to you?

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PG: tabula rasa is an idealized Szenario - by knowing that it's hardly possible - but giving it all, that is my approach. 

I try to be in meditative presence - still, calm, open and aware. If the energy of the object or the scenario triggers and evokes something inside I listen. So what is the right angle, what is the perimeter of the scenario, the frame to condense what I feel. Some objects have not also a general attribution but also a story, a context and a metaphorical character that meets my state.

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For instance an old, worn out, buckled up very old oil drum I discovered on a little Street in old town in Cairo. Immediately I recognized the impressive sculptural power of the object - imagine this one exhibited in a white cube art gallery room! 

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Since I was a little boy I am fascinated by the magic power of images. For hours on end I was looking at pictures in the books of my parents turning pages in an almost meditative state. I vividly remember my fascination looking at the work of Max Ernst Yves Klein and others while sitting on the green fitted carpet in the living room with my pantyhose on. 

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KM: In Cairo, you focused on the essence of covered cars parked on the side of the road. To many, a car cover might be considered mundane, yet you draw out its symbolic power. What does this metaphorical represent to you? And what does it speak about the inhabitants of the area?

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PG: For me a sculpture combines form and content - space and time in an extraordinary way. It enables the object from its normal attribution. I love sculptural images because it appears to be charged with symbolic energy.
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It starts with a certain mindset, with Intuition or an impulse.
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With the Studio Cairo Project it happened quickly and instantly. I saw a documentary about Cairo where a news reporter in the streets was talking to the camera; in the back- ground, for a few seconds, I encountered some beautiful parked cars cover...spectacular and never seen in this colorful and caring fashion before. I was hooked immediately.
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Two weeks later I was sitting in a plane to start my Studio Cairo Project...just because of 3 compelling and awe-inspiring seconds of footage.

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I did not know a lot more about Cairo before that moment..apart from common knowledge like pyramids and such. I tried to keep it that way to have that evenly-suspended attention you mentioned...that "hovering" attention“ of Freud... 

Everybody knows the shape of a car but it becomes something else when covered. I don’t know if there is a car underneath, and I never wanted to check and/or reveal them in order to keep these mysterious sculptures alive. Especially in Cairo where the owners put a lot of effort into making it bespoke. Cover and protect the things of value with vanity and proudness. Often Male car owners put a lot of effort into making it look fancy, humorous and original. This Effort seems to charge up the sculpture so that sometimes it happens that the background seems to communicate with the object by assimilation in color or structure.  So it is also a mirror of the people and the densely populated megacity - glimpses of their attitude, their hopes, dreams and feelings. 

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KM: Not in a corny way, but your work gives me the vibe that 'one person's trash is another person's treasure.' How do you navigate this dichotomy, and what reactions do you hope to evoke in your audience?

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PG: You can always look at it in two ways - in a not only but also way ( Non solum sed etiam ) - I try to accept a world full of contradiction - because it is the way the world works in my opinion. Picture the famous parable of the lotus flower blooming in the sewage. Looking at the world with equanimity together with an open heart it leads to compassion and empathy when things like trash or abandoned Items show other potential qualities from time to time - they work as metaphors symbols or Allegories for something else.

I sense it is sometimes pragmatism and simply the absence of economic power combined with creativity, pride, prestige and humor that subconsciously produces great art sculptures.To observe and capture that „readymades“ is what fascinates and intrigues me. 

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KM: The transformation of everyday objects into something new is a recurring theme in your art. Could you walk us through your process of reconceptualizing an "ordinary object" into a work of art? How do you decide when an object has reached its final artistic form?

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PG: I have two conflicting methods for my work. One is called “Situation“ and the other one is called “Rekombination“

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In the Situation I observe, encounter or see something interesting, compelling or beautiful So at the scene I leaving everything the way it is and only try to be an, “Interpreter of matter“ by finding the right moment, the right light, the right point of view, the right compo- sition, the right camera and the right exposure settings to enable the object to tell it’s story. That is one way for me to add synthesis and meaning to it. Accepting that subjectivity and therefore ambivalence is not only a given but a necessity in this case - the very source of an artist’s power and mandate in my point of view.

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Sometimes multiplication is what makes it magic. The arrangement of many alike objects stacked on top of each other. E.g. in the Studio Dakar Series (Senegal) hundreds of piled up plastic Chairs on a landfill in the outskirts of the city. A classic piece of design called Monoblock that everybody knows and everybody has been sitting on regardless of social class, political views or origin finally end up as a mountain.

With the “Rekombination“ method, on the other hand, I actively create images and introduce my creativity by putting things together. I change backgrounds and/or the frame of reference. I try to make strong and intense still life Images - mainly in the Studio. For instance the image of a pig’s heart Studio Kampala #1, or the Shoot A Load Series, where I photographed heavy loaded bicycles in Kampala Uganda. I used a semi transparent shade net to manipulate the frame of reference and therefore underline the sculptural quality of the object with my camera as an expressive tool. For me there’s power in both forms. The “Rekombination“ as well as the “Situation“ needs Authorship in the frame where the expression lies a lot in the color and the form, the emotion in the process and the truth in the specificity. 

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KM:  In 'Studio Cairo', cars and their components become a lens through which you examine the sociocultural environment. What have you learned about Cairo's community through this lens?

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PG: The sociocultural environment plays a major role of course. it colorizes the spirit of the final image. You see love and dedication and ambition in everyday life via the objects they are surrounded by. It is basically a mirror for all the above.

I find the people - in the parts of Cairo where I have been - a very central densely populated and old part of the city - have a lot of humor although for some it is hard to make a living. 

The car parts to me are like the bones of a machine..and maybe a hint what’s underneath the surface…but I will never uncover the truth ;-) for a book on this project I used a very small camera a Ricoh G3, so that helped me as well to blend in and find these “readymades“

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Usually I work with analog cameras like the linhof technika 4x5“ or the mamiya RZ67..which is of course a bit more time consuming and evokes more attention for the people passing by - I love such interactions and smalltalk!

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KM: Finally, if the trash you collect and photograph could speak, what do you think it would say about its journey from being a discarded object to a celebrated subject in your art?

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PG: “The cut worm forgives the plow/Dip him in the river who loves water” ― (a quote from William Blake ;-)

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web: petergarmusch.com | ig: @peter_garmusch

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NULL SOCIETY Interview with PETER GARMUSCH