Steiner Lenzlinger – Homage As Growth and Decay
he exhibition NATIONALPARK was orchestrated by Gerda Steiner & Jörg Lenzlinger as a grand and final tribute to the Sulserbau that served as “Naturhistorisches und Nationlparkmuseum” from 1960 to 1989, and then as the Bündner Kunstmuseum. This popular building is going to be torn down to make room for a large extension. Their installation paid homage to the original function of the building by reintroducing growth, decay, and the glorious displays of forms and colors that intervene between these states of matter.Their "park" constantly changed as its plant and crystal components evolved from the longest to the shortest days of the year.
The artist duo transformed the Sulserbau from the basement up to the gables. They tore out the fixtures and used them to build a mountain landscape; diverted the roof water to form streams; opened the museum windows to welcome the sun, wind and rain into the interior. They also planted an array of crops that the artists hoped would attracts many insects and animals.
Then they added collections and accumulations of objects that blur the boundaries between the artistic, the artificial and the natural. In the course of the six months, the plants and crystals grew into a fantasmagoria of visual splendor, and then decayed and faded.
In the Nationalpark garden tableaus, the artists created “fields of thought” and “sources of knowledge” in order to inspire new ideas and conceptions of what nature and the museum could be. As the press release states, “The exhibition is a seedbed for invention, a hothouse of fantasy, an observation space for art and an ecosystem of unexpected activities.”
In 2014 the Swiss National Park, June 22 to December 21, 2013, celebrated its 100-year jubilee, for which the exhibition at the Bündner Kunstmuseum is the artistic kick-off.
Gerda Steiner (1967) & Jörg Lenzlinger (1964) have been working together since 1997. They have made a name for themselves nationally and internationally with large, expansive installations, which they developed for the respective locations, for instance for the Swiss National Exposition, the Expo.02 (Heimatmaschine), for the Venice Biennale/church San Staë (Giardino calante, 2003), for the Stiftsbibliothek St. Gallen (Seelenwärmer, 2005), at the ACCA Melbourne (water hole, 2009), at the Arp Museum, Rolandseck (Hochwasser, 2011), at the Art Tower Mito, Japan (power sources, 2012).