WERNER HUTHMACHER, ULRIKE LUDWIG | The Completed Blueprint

Opening: Friday, 9 January 2009, 7 p.m.

The opening takes place in A trans Pavillion, Hackesche Höfe, Hof III.
Exhibition: 10 January - 7 February 2009

Part One: A trans Pavilion, Hackesche Höfe, Hof III, 10 - 17 January 2009
Part Two: Galerie Loris, Gartenstraße 114, 21 January - 7 February 2009
Finissage Galerie Loris: Saturday, 7 February 2009, 5 p.m.

In their first joint artistic work The Completed Blueprint, Werner Huthmacher and Ulrike Ludwig connect the A trans Pavilion and the Loris Gallery to form a local exhibition project. The two locations and their specific architecture – situated in different urban surroundings but close to one another – are the starting point for an artistic intervention in the broader field of photography. 

The artists deal with architectural marketing strategies, the real estate business and its promises of all things good, and the representation of planning utopias and architectural competitions. Huthmacher and Ludwig themselves set about selling an attractive view. By producing modern, flexible, even portable mini-architecture – fashionable bags – they reduce the idea of customized living space to absurdity. 

The Completed Blueprint project is divided into two parts. The first takes place in the glass A trans Pavilion structure in the picturesque Hackesche Höfe. Following its comprehensive refurbishment, the latter developed into a Berlin tourism magnet. The fashion boutiques, firms, restaurants and cafés located there can be regarded as a sign of the prospering Aufbau Ost (rebuilding of the former East German economy). Huthmacher and Ludwig place the attractive view of the Pavilion on the market as if it were a building or development project. For this purpose, they erected an advertising panel in Hof III of the Hackesche Höfe containing a vast weatherproof reproduction. 

The giant print is a photographic view seen through the glass façade of the A trans Pavilion. Superimposed on this image is the raster of a secondary exploitation: the pattern of a popular fashion accessory, a shoulder bag. Development model and fashion hype overlap each other directly. The Pavilion, with its rigid architectural design, serves as an information box in which the project is showcased with the help of a model, plans, and information leaflets. Option warrants for plots, to be converted later into bags, can be bought at an affordable price. First buyers are guaranteed the best part of the view. 

A week later the project moves to Gartenstraße. The giant-size cut-out will be exhibited as an art object in the classic white cube of the Loris Gallery. Both the blueprint, on which the respective sales are noted, and the bag model acquire a sculptural value. Bit by bit, the blueprint is completed. 

The Completed Blueprint exhibition is a cooperation between the Loris – Galerie für zeitgenössische Kunst and A trans Pavilion, curated by An Seebach and Isolde Nagel. Fashion designer Sonja Lotz developed the bag pattern for the project.