Museum of Modern an Contemporary Art Bolzano Museion – (IT)

Raphael Pohl uses various found and borrowed objects from domestic, commercial, or industrial contexts to create spatial choreographies.

At the Museion, two conventional turnstiles, temporarily stripped of their function, and two aluminum molds for ice slushies borrowed by Pohl from a Vienna kiosk enter into a silent dialogue of material language. What connects these objects with the daily routine of a Georgian baker, who is filmed making thirty-six loaves of bread in thirteen minutes? Set against an opulent LED wall commonly associated with the world of urban advertising, these pieces immediately raise questions regarding the attention economy: How much value and importance is attached, for example, to the everyday practice of a baker in the streets of Batumi, who continually puts out fresh flatbread in the window of his kiosk for just-in-time pickup by his customers? Not much is said in the film, but the few conversations that do occur are repeated.

Doublings or pairings that change location appear on several levels in Pohl‘s installation, which was guided by ideas around absence, imitation, and substitution. The artist usually bases his multimedia sculptural arrangements on keywords or poems, fragments of which flash onto the screen here as subtitles in the video. Like a rebus, Pohl‘s installation prompts us to reflect on the different relationships between places, generations, and economies and on what unites, separates, and reunites the simplest of small businesses with international consumer and trade centers.

yet lonely hue I.I, 2024
one slushy container cast in aluminum
70 x 80 x 41 cm

yet lonely hue I.II, 2023
borrowed plastic slushy container, countless peppercorns
various dimensions

installation view, renaissance, 2024