About the Work
Michael Beutler sees the exhibition space as occasion and setting for art production. The artist started from the existing architectural conditions to develop his installation 'Two Arches'. The concrete-and-wood constructions are covered in fabric and set into the area between the ceiling and the walls. The artist made use of the formwork elements of the concrete ceiling - as the architects would have done - to create a model for the casting. The form of the arches is derived from their curvature. Their positioning highlights the fact that the walls have no load-bearing function, and with it, the main characteristic of the architecture. While the choice of concrete is determined by the specification of the construction material, the colour combinations reference fabric pictures by Blinky Palermo. The object-like quality of Palermo's canvas pictures is heightened to the extreme in Beutler's work. The filling material joins with the fabric to create a random structure on the surface, thereby emphasising the construction and becoming a painterly gesture.
