Ute Eitzenhöfer: Subtext

Ute Eitzenhöfer’s jewellery directly references contemporary events. The artist juxtaposes longevity, a byword of precious metals and gemstones, with the rapid development of social realities. At the same time, she raises questions concerning our perception, which is increasingly overwhelmed with the speed and cacophony of news, images and videos.
For her Talk series of works, Ute Eitzenhöfer has produced geometric-looking assemblages of blackened silver, which when worn on the lapel are reminiscent of small microphones familiar to us from the media. They demonstrate how much we all fi nd ourselves in presentation mode – ready at any time to step in front of the nearest (phone-)camera, in order to share our opinions and post them on the appropriate social media networks.

The works from the Discourse series, on the other hand, just like the book title itself, stage a play between revealing and concealing. Whereas the natural stone in the objects can only be seen around the edges, it is the processed surface of the metal that is the dominating factor. And no matter how great the desire is to see the shimmering stone in its entirety, we are not permitted access.

Finally, the brooches in the Circle series represent smallscale stages, in which the visibility of the interior spaces is only possible through the light emerging through the various apertures. Due to their timeless aesthetic, the minimalistic looking jewellery objects nonetheless open up to a myriad of perspectives. They do not adhere to a refl ection of power and powerlessness in dealing with a world that has meanwhile become highly complex; when worn, the brooches instead embolden us and bring about an intuitive exchange in us – their wearers and observers – far beyond a tacit state of communication.

The full-page works are contrasted in the book with pixelated, indecipherable photographs. An essay by Wilhelm Lindemann examines the works from a cultural-historical perspective.