Moth (Falter II) -
what does Gustave Courbet's painting The Wave has to do with cotton?
Winterthur, Switzerland, 2021
Intervention in a former bus depot
Färberstrasse, Weberstrasse, Seidenstrasse, ...
(Dyers Street, Weavers Street, Silk Street, ...)
The bus depot (in earlier days a tram depot) is situated in the middle of a quarter where the street names are reminders of the times when Winterthur was one of Switzerland’s most important industrial towns for trading and production of textiles.
In the depot, I have related different things to each other from different perspectives and from different times. Their common point of intersection is cotton or the trade in cotton.
What does Gustave Courbet's painting The Wave have to do with cotton?
In the exhibition, which lasted only one day, I guided visitors in small groups through the hall of about 300m2, exploring this question.
Elements of the exhibition:
- Photographs taken on a journey / Photographs I took on a journey through the south of India relate to the colonial past of India or document an ancient craft still practised today: The construction of Urus (Malayalam: fat boat). Vessels made only of wood (teak). Once built for the trade between India and Arabia, they are now constructed only when a rich businessman from the Emirates orders one for leisure.
- An array of objects (old wooden stools from the depot, roof battens and pieces of ceramic) refers to the painting of Gustave Courbet's The wave. It is part of the collection Oskar Reinhart "Am Römerholz".
Oskar Reinhart was a patron and art collector from Winterthur. He donated his private collection to the state of Switzerland in 1955.
He was the youngest son of Theodor Reinhart. From 1912 he took over his father-in-law Salomon Volkart’s trading company Volkart Brothers Winterthur & Bombay with his sons.
The cotton trade was the most important branch of their company. Their headquarters were in the still existing tall semi-circular building near the railway station.
The monumentality of the building recollects the time when the company was the fourth biggest cotton merchant in the world.
- The laid open "ditch" for the mechanics and the floor to ceiling cotton curtain are my primary interventions into the architecture of the depot.
The size of the curtain, the unity of shape and colour emphasize the nature of the former workshop for buses and trams, at the same time the curtain by its materiality cotton recalls the processing of raw textile products in this part of the town.
Finally, in a letter to IKEA I ask them about the origin and the conditions of production of their cotton fabric I bought in bulk. The draft of the letter is fixed to the wall opposite the curtain. (The letter remains unanswered.)
Part of the multi-parted work group Mahagony
Acknowledgement:
- Anutoshen M. Hüer (setup)
- With the kind financial support of the municipality of Zurich (working stipend Covid‑19)