FELD

In the strictest sense, a field is the result of forces that lend a specific dynamiccharacter to the surrounding space. [...] The lines connecting all points with corresponding force effects are force or field lines. If a single element is altered, a new field emerges that has no points in common with the previous one. The field thus reacts as a whole, i.e., it is a form or dynamic totality. (Dorsch, Encyclopedia of Psychology) Messner’s sculptures emerge from a tension between parado­xical conceptual ideas and respond to the architecture of the Neue Atelier at Villa Stuck. On the ground floor, a space­filling drawing on the floor marks out a space; anyone entering the space becomes part of the installation. On the upper floor, visitors are greeted by an architectural sculpture: a house – in which interior and exterior merge into one another – within the home of the ‘artist­monarch’ Franz von Stuck. The tension that the artist creates through his works develops around the concept of the expansion of the inner world and the retreat of the outer world. As a result of this shift, the contrasts and relationships that previously existed disappear from the percep­ tions of both the individual and society. ‘Field’, the title of the exhibition, is a term which, in physics as in other sciences, such as sociology or philosophy, carries diffe­ rent meanings, yet always denotes tensions, connections and relationships. In addition to the different materials and their respective surface textures, light also plays a central role in Messner’s in­situ work. The constantly changing daylight shining in through the large studio windows and the skylight becomes a key element of the installation.