Elke Maier, PLUNGED INTO THE LIGHT, 2010, Temporary Art Intervention in the Collegiate Church Salzburg
copyright © Elke Maier © Foto: Emiliano Bolgherie
Elke Maier, PLUNGED INTO THE LIGHT, 2010, Temporary Art Intervention in the Collegiate Church Salzburg
copyright © Elke Maier Foto: Wegenkittl, Galerie Weihergut
Elke Maier, PLUNGED INTO THE LIGHT 2010, Temporary Art Intervention in the Collegiate Church Salzburg
copyright © Elke Maier Foto: Wegenkittl, Galerie Weihergut
Elke Maier, PLUNGED INTO THE LIGHT, 2010, Temporary Art Intervention in the Collegiate Church Salzburg
copyright © Elke Maier Foto: Wegenkittl, Galerie Weihergut
Elke Maier, PLUNGED INTO THE LIGHT, 2010, Temporary Art Intervention in the Collegiate Church Salzburg
Elke Maier, KAIROS 2022, Nikolauskirche in Fussach am Bodensee
Foto: Roswitha Rosenstein
© Elke Maier,: TRANSLUCENT LENTEN VEIL, Saint Stephens Cathedral Vienna, Austria, 2014
© Elke Maier, 2014 : TRANSLUCENT LENTEN VEIL,St. Stephens Cathedral Vienna, Austria
© Elke Maier, 2008, Temporary Art Intervention in the Neumünster Church Würzburg
Elke Maier, LICHTUNGEN, 2017: Markuskirche Hannover Foto: Wickbold
Elke Maier, 2008: Hochspannung. Eine Verwebung der Turbinenhalle. Kelag-Schaukraftwerk Forstsee, Wörthersee
Material: finest white cotton thread
Elke Maier, 2008: HIGH TENSION. Temporary Art Intervention, Kelag Power Plant Forstsee at Lake Wörth (A)
Material: finest white cotton thread
I have been focussing on artistic interventions in sacral spaces for decades. My work has already been appreciated by thousands of visitors in numerous churches across the German-speaking world: in the Collegiate (University) Church in Salzburg (2010) the famous baroque church by Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach in the heart of the festival city as well as in the Saint Stephens` Cathedral in Vienna (2014) one of the most important Gothic cathedrals in Europe or in the Culture Capital Graz (2003)
To create my art installations I use a multitude of finest white silken threads as fine as a hair, which depending upon how the light oscillates between the visible and the invisible, always alternating between presence and absence and only becoming really perceptible when the sun is being reflected. This will often occur for only short moments, in a transition from an invisible to a visible presence.
Each one of the innumerable very fine white threads appears process-oriented, in a continual dialogue with the sunlight. An ever-changing process, which cannot be controlled. When each one of the many threads is lighting up, the innermost space becomes illuminated.
"I see form not as an ultimate boundary but as a process, as the visible manifestation of traces of movement, transgressing space and material. The form still indicates the progressive process of its development. Thread and space are not in opposition, but they interpenetrate and integrate one another: Thread intervention and space are not two contradictory poles / do not form a contradictory polarity / but rather a continuum of two equally interwoven movements of light, which occur in a transition from the one to the other and which have to perform a continuous metamorphosis"
The uncountable threads do not form an available object with a fixed identity, with defined limits, but first at all an open translucent transparent space, which can be best experienced as a place of contemplation / open translucent transparent spaces that have no limit themselves and thus create a moment of infinity within the boundaries of space.
The substance of my artwork is merely a touch, almost unnoticeable and virtually absent for the perception. One can almost neglect the physical mass. It changes into space, or rather it defines the space. So we could say, that my installations are primarily composed of intermediate spaces.
I develop every art intervention specially from the very beginning in a process of continual dialogue with the interior and the incidence of the sunlight, moving in it. The idea, form and creative process are inseparably combined with the authenticity of the specific space. So, each one of them is unique and cannot be transferred to any other place.
Die unzähligen Fäden bilden kein verfügbares Objekt mit einer fixen Identität, mit definierten Grenzen, sondern zunächst einmal einen offenen, durchsichtigen, transparenten Raum, der am besten als Ort der Kontemplation erfahren werden kann / offene, durchsichtige, transparente Räume, die selbst keine Grenze haben und so innerhalb der Grenzen des Raumes ein Moment der Unendlichkeit schaffen.
Die Substanz ihrer Kunstwerke ist nur ein Hauch, fast unmerklich und für die Wahrnehmung nahezu abwesend. Man kann die physische Masse fast vernachlässigen. Sie geht in den Raum über, oder besser gesagt, sie definiert den Raum. Man könnte also sagen, dass die Installationen vor allem aus Zwischenräumen bestehen.
Elke Maier entwickelt jede künstlerische Intervention speziell von Anfang an in einem Prozess des ständigen Dialogs mit dem Innenraum und dem Einfall des Sonnenlichts, das sich darin bewegt. Die Idee, die Form und der kreative Prozess sind untrennbar mit der Authentizität des jeweiligen Raumes verbunden. So ist jede von ihnen einzigartig und auf keinen anderen Ort übertragbar..