OVER THE BLUE DEPTHS
collected objects, alabaster gypsum
variable dimensions
2019
Over the Blue Depths is a site-specific installation, composed of a disk and a letter.
A monument and a tool, the artwork explores the concept of art as communication.To form its disk, four blueprints were combined, three from nearby prehistoric observatories. The fourth is a blueprint of Goliath, the VLF transmitter used by the German navy in service from 1943to 1945. The contraposition of four blueprints is a platform for the engravings of on-site collected objects that form a codex. Hanging above the codex is the first letter written using it. This letter conveys a message written by Peter Cremer, a german U-boat commander during the Second World War in which he describes his feelings about the Goliath transmitter:
“And yet over the blue depths we never felt alone, but rather as a tightly knit family continually connected.”
Transcending the line that separates the visual from the written, this letter questions the meaning(s) and relativity of the written word and language in general when taken out of it's original context. The original codex and the original context will dissolve. What will remain is the first letter written using the codex, engraved on the disc.
This project was realised during a residency period and with the support of Künstlerstad Kalbe.
Residency coordinator: Corinna Köbele