SAVOIR-VIVRE #7
COPPER WORKSHOP
In the garden behind ar/ge kunst and in the gallery space
with Laurenz Stockner, artist blacksmith
curated by BAU
“Mapuche silverwork is the synthesis of all collective needs and the tangible expression of a long and permanent conversation between the ancestors and the living in the Mapu.” Mauro Millán
The pieces of jewellery in Silver Rights, the current exhibition at ar/ge kunst, are the result of a close collaboration between silversmith and Mapuche activist Mauro Millán and Italian artist Elena Mazzi. Starting from her research in Patagonia, which has long been at the centre of conflict, claims and counterclaims to the territories of the indigenous Mapuche people, Mazzi deepens the close connection between this indigenous community and its land (mapu). An important part of Mapuche material culture is jewellery made from local silver.
This close connection between raw material and individual existence is also palpable in the metalwork of Laurenz Stockner from Brixen. For some twenty years the decommissioned mine at Prettau has provided Stockner with the raw material he uses for his copper bowls: a dark, earthy substance called cement copper. After visiting the exhibition Silver Rights with the curators of the Public Programme, Laurenz Stockner will engage participants in a fascinating dialogue with copper, from raw material through fire and water to finished form; smelting, purifying, forging, casting, working.
Laurenz Stockner (b. Brixen, 1971) is a blacksmith. Having trained as a locksmith he went on to study goldsmithery in Florence and subsequently made blacksmithery his chosen form of artistic expression. In 2003 he founded his own workshop in St Andrä. His work has been exhibited in numerous group and solo shows at home and abroad since 2004.
The Copper workshop is part of the workshop series savoir–vivre, which is conceived in parallel to the ar/ge kunst exhibition programme. The title savoir-vivre is based on a re-reading of the terms savoir and pouvoir in the work of Gayatri Spivak, co-founder of postcolonial theory, where knowledge (savoir) is not only linked to power but also to the condition of being able to (pouvoir). This combination of verbs turns the institution into a public space of negotiation and agency where an exploration of different forms of skills and competences produces collective knowledge.
maximum 20 participants
attendance free
language: deu/ita
registration at [email protected]
Participation at the workshop is only possible with a Corona Pass.
