75 years after the end of the Second World War, Kessler created the two works As if I would care and Something falls apart – 1mm a decade, in response to the ongoing mass dumping of weapons that are steadily decaying in our oceans, emitting their toxic ingredients in the process. For As if I would care the artist throws a running video camera into the sea again and again 75 times in total. The process of her getting rid of and retrieving the camera is photographed. Those images get combined in a photo tableau that documents the artistic intervention. The corresponding video work consists of the recordings of the camera and opens up the perspective of the disposed object.
From the Series Earthly Matters:
At the height of global capitalism, we continue to consume, produce and live in a world that cannot regenerate at nearly the same speed. The body of work Earthly Matters defines our scope of action within this scenario as a space for imagination. Simone Kessler‘s current works from installations and sculptures to film, photographs and drawings. Each work is dedicated, in its way, to central questions: Which problems do we have to face today? Which other images of tomorrow are already possible? How can we think them together? To use the last words of a science fiction trilogy by Octavia E. Butler: How can we sow them into fertile soil?
Earthly Matters is a body of work since 2019