Artist: Felix Kindermann
Exhibition title: Social Inventories
Venue: Essex Flowers, New York, US
Date: August 2 – 11, 2024
Photography: all images copyright and courtesy of the artist and Essex Flowers, New York
Essex Flowers is pleased to present Social Inventories, a solo exhibition by Felix Kindermann. Human behavior is shaped not only by the interactions between people, but is informed by the built environment and the values assigned to it. The objects and images in Social Inventories serve as a platform to unpack this process of signification—the act of assigning meaning to ambiguous signs.
Taking inspiration from Pierre Bourdieu’s theory of social capital, in which ownership of objects and experiences signify one’s social class regardless of actual wealth, Kindermann flips the script to question the social functioning of semi-public amenities. The awning, like the pool and the fence—other ambiguous features of our built environment and previous entities of Kindermann’s artistic research—rely on the subjectivity of its users and their relationality to class for their signification. The awning on the Park Avenue co-op and the Brooklyn bodega might have roots in the same materials, or may even be produced by the same manufacturer, yet their context and usage charge the social value of the seemingly neutral architectural feature, determining the manner in which it is used. Stripped of their skin and placed inside the gallery, the physical interiority and exteriority of Kindermann’s awnings are subverted, questioning both spatial and social inclusion and exclusion.
Kindermann furthers his investigation with the use of the original images on loan from the New York Public Library, gesturing towards another ambiguity in form and in content. Standing between the lions on 5th Avenue, one might forget that the knowledge held in this building belongs to all New Yorkers, yet through the practice of appropriating and exhibiting these holdings, Kindermann reminds of the commons that are shared through cooperative systems such as the public library. By featuring images belonging to the Picture Collection specifically, the artist calls forth a process of categorization undertaken by the librarians, in which each image must be named, numbered, and, most importantly, assigned a subject heading, of which there are more than 12,000 distinct values. In this case, even the objective scientific principles of taxonomy are held to the subjective associations by the practitioners.
The exhibition title, Social Inventories, is perhaps elucidated further by its German translation: Soziale Bestandsaufnahmen. The first root of the compound word Bestandsaufnahme, or bestehen, is translated literally as “existence” or “insistence,” while the latter aufnehmen means “to receive,” “to establish,” or “to take up.” Inventories, in this exhibition, are not the domain of the backroom store clerk, but rather that of all humans and their social communication, which becomes revealed once we pierce through to the underlying structures of our built environment.
Felix Kindermann is an interdisciplinary artist currently based in Brussels, Belgium. Central to his work is the social relationship between individuals within our collective society. He earned an MFA in Industrial Design from HfbK (Hochschule für bildende Künste Hamburg) and an MFA in Visual Art from Sint-Lukas Brussels. He is currently Visiting Professor for Mixed Media and Sculpture at LUCA School of Arts, Ghent and was a stipend at ISCP (International Studio & Curatorial Program) New York 2022-23. His work was exhibited at Gallery Jahn und Jahn, Lisbon (2024); Z33, Hasselt (2024); Goethe-Institut New York, New York (2023); Lewis Center for the Arts, Princeton (2023); P.A.D., New York (2023); Whitebox Art Center, New York (2022); Kunsthal Gent (2021); Simultanhalle and Museum Ludwig, Cologne (2021); KANAL — Centre Pompidou, Brussels (2020); KIT — Kunst im Tunnel (2020); S.M.A.K. — Stedelijk Museum voor Actuele Kunst, Ghent (2019); Museum Dhondt-Dhaenens, Deurle (2019); Fondation CAB, Brussels (2019) and Staatliche Kunsthalle Baden-Baden, 45cbm (2015), Baden-Baden among others.
The exhibition is supported by the Flemish Arts Council and SOFAM.
