Laura Schawelka (Double Issues) (German Edition)

In her often space-consuming installations, Laura Schawelka makes use of photography, video, and sculpture in a multilayered dialog in which traditional definitions such as subject, image content, or image carrier are called into question. Images are shown as larger than life or miniaturized; they become backgrounds or are equipped with props. In her latest work, the artist focuses on the role of photography in the development of modern consumer society—from the first department stores in Paris to the present day. In doing so, she shines a light on online trade, among other things: What does it mean if goods are only communicated through other goods, computers, cell phones, tablets—in short, screens? If feeling something in a store is replaced by swiping on a touchscreen? If this distance, this withholding of the genuine object, is precisely what prompts the desire for it in the first place?