The gallery Lombardi—Kargl presented the second chapter of the project 17(Joy) conceived by Jen Kratochvil: Department Joy with Jack Hauser & Sabina Holzer, curated by Stella Rollig.

Department Joy is a departure of actions, dreams, traces and speculations. The clothes on view act as agents—time-space companions guiding us through a multi-perspective future. They support joyful, uncanny explorations of the fault lines between performing and exhibiting art. Live art, lines, letters, and light imprints play with the stars. How might a ‘community to come’ emerge?

Photo: Kunst-Dokumentaion, Manuel Carreon Lopez. Department Joy, Vernissage. Performance: Miss Coochie träumt,
Sabina Holzer & Elena Peytchinska.

Joy #2: Department Joy delves deeper into the ephemeral nature of the overarching dramaturgy, experimenting with diverse durational formats and the notion of performative sculpture. The project unfolds across three announced events – Vernisage, Midisage, Finisage – and a series of unannounced, spontaneous happenings and occurrences within a setting which oscillates between work and workshop. Throughout, Jack Hauser and Sabina Holzer will engage artistic friends and collaborators to take part in shaping the unfolding experience.

Photo by the artists, Department Joy, Finissage.

Jack Hauser and Sabina Holzer regard garments as independent agents, objects as portals, and photographs as traces of light. The space becomes a fault line of hybrid activity, a zone linked to a multiplicity of “we.” It invites us to attune to the performance of things—their materiality, their weight, the ways they hold and reflect light. Through their activations, they tap into sensual time and sensual memory. In the intervals between human and more-than-human actors, room opens for pauses, shifting rhythms, and interruptions. Every visit becomes a performance. Every material performs.

Photos: Kunst-Dokumentaion, Manuel Carreon Lopez. Department Joy, Vernissage. Performance: Make a wish by Miss Coochie aka Sabina Holzer.

colours stretched like hair 

spun from leaves

light bleeding through their veins
each in a different state of becoming

all pressing softly

against walls and stones

nothing stands on its own

everything leans and vibrates
[texts for the spaceship, Sabina Holzer]

Photos by the artists. Department Joy, Midisage.

objects as portals
instruments of communion
to draw nearer to another’s body,
leaving traces of skin,
saliva, and tears behind
clothes as agents
textures as thresholds
to become other
side to side
[texts for the spaceship, Sabina Holzer]

Photos by the artists. Department Joy, Vinissage.

Throughout the entire duration of the project, Jack Hauser & Sabina Holzer collaborated with artist friends and colleagues—the “band“: Stella Rollig, Jeroen Peeters, Niamo Lattner, Alix Eynaudi, Jan Meartens, Anna Rocha, Krassimira Kruschkova, Philipp Gehmacher, WITHING aka: Emma Cocker, Laressa Dickey, Sabina Holzer, Ines Marita Schärer, Delphine Chapuis-Schmitz, Litó Walkey. And Elena Peytchinska, Esther Strauß, Susanne Müller, Claudia Heu, Elisabeth Flunger, Thomas Ballhausen, Oisin Mohagan, Karlheinz Essl, David Ender, Agnes Schneidewind.

Photos by the artists, Department Joy.

Photos by the artists, Department Joy. Performance: Weißer Paul Sernine, Jack Hauser.