Скопје на Кензо Танге

SUB OBJECT ... OR BETWEEN SUBJECT AND OBJECT
Exhibition by Michael Schluder and Sergej Nikoljski
On the occasion of the 11th Architecture Biennale in Venice, Italy

On the opening day, Michael Schluder and Sergej Nikoljski will be present and glad to answer any questions concerning SUB OBJECT.

Under the motto SUB OBJECT …or between subject and object the exhibition by  Michael Schluder and Sergej Nikoljski at the Campo San Francesco della Vigna focuses on the true nature of the lagoon city. The eternity-made objects presented at the exhibition represent a new interpretation of the so-called "passerellas" the small footbridges that are used in Venice during high water ("acqua alta"). The exhibition can be visited at free admission from September 14 until November 14, 2008.

The sinking of the city is a process Venice and its inhabitants have to face and to cope with. 100 days per year the high water dominates the face of the lagoon city and thus also considerable influences everyday life of the people living there.  It is this elementary topic that Michael Schluder and Sergej Nikoljski tackle with their concept and implementation of SUB OBJECT.

While the object had originally been planned only to be used during high water in Venice, the two architects decided, after in-depth considerations, to develop an object with dual function. This duality is now also reflected in the choice of the outer form in which SUB OBJECT was created and designed.

An S-shaped loop, a wave turned into stone and a straight slab unified with each other – that’s the new "passerella". If the eternit object is used as a single unit, it serves as a piece of city-furniture. If several objects are aligned one after the other, they form an ornament and turn into an auxiliary construction for cases of high water. SUB OBJECT can be stacked on top of each other and arranged in most versatile ways. With its never ending combination possibilities, SUB OBJECT offers the spectator constantly changing, new views and perceptions.

The formed slab, shaped like a wave, perfectly fits into its surrounding and breathes the flair that the city with the legendary myth, located on the Adriatic coast of upper Italy, has been radiating at all times.

For more than 10 years architect Michael Schluder (born 1956 in Vienna) and Sergej Nikoljski (born 1962 in Skopje) have consistently been working together at the intersection between architecture and design.

In October 2002, they participated, among other things, in the BIO 18 Biennial for Industrial Design in Ljubljana as the representatives of Austria. In their work focussing on social ergonomics, their pieces of furniture named "Stand by me" and "Pisolino" represented an essential contribution to this topic, which, in September 2003,  became also the focus of the "la movida" exhibition at the gallery Engelhorn and of a discussion round held in this context. The first piece of work made from the material eternit, i.e. fiber cement, was exhibited under the name "Skunit" at the 2004 "Form im Dialog" exhibition which took place at the Factory Kunsthalle Krems.

The two architects’ high competence as designers is evidenced by their perfect adaptation of forms to the human workflow and needs. The furniture design "Castillo" was presented in October 2003, on the occasion of "One and a half room", an exhibition following the concept of the Russian-American writer and Nobel prize winner for literature, Joseph Brodsky. Schluder & Nikoljski presented their design furniture, among many other occasions, also within the framework of the following exhibitions: 2007 "Design im MuseumsQuartier Wien – d.sign Plattform", Vienna; 2006 "Die Enzykopädie der wahren Werte", at the k/haus, Vienna; and 2004 "Form im Dialog", at the Factory Kunsthalle Krems, Lower Austria.
Since 1988, architect Michael Schluder manages his own architecture firm in Vienna, with a branch office established in Berlin. Sergej Nikoljski works as an independent architect in Vienna

For further information or any other questions please refer to:

schluder/nikoljski
Marktgasse 3-7/11
A-1090 Vienna

or
schluder architektur ZT GmbH
Heinrichsgasse 2/9
A-1010 Vienna
T +43 (0) 1 533 65 34
F +43 (0) 1 533 65 34-9
E office@architecture.at
http://www.architecture.at
http://www.austria-architects.com

SUBOBJECT or between the substance and the object

The artwork by S.N.I.K. titled "Process Venice" reveals a new phenomenon, a novelty both as a term and appearance - the SUB OBJECT. Its complex phenomenology consists of the inability to provide a single definition for it, neither as a substance (organizational item, principle, gesture), nor as an object (applied body), as it unites both at the same time.
In that way it becomes a symbolic particle, a discarnate body that invites active interpretation. It indicates the process of its appearance but also its open shape that we should complete and this participate in it in an ontological sense.  
At one moment, it is self-referent; at another, it is contextually discursive.
The seemingly simple geometry is an illustration of the primordial dialectics of using of energy – motion as a shape-creating principle, which in this case is a self-organising self-resemblance. It is composed of a basic sinusoid open wave and a straight line. They indicate two ontological projections, continuity and discontinuity, or the two elementary temporal reflections: circle and linear time.  
The wave, as such, is movement, a basic dichotomy of full and empty, of presence and absence; it is a meta-stabile supra-moveable unification point. The straight line contains in itself the condition of sameness, stillness and silence.
This geometry of appearance can be identified and used as a special shape, as elementary composition or a complex network. The emerging composite generative knot is indicating a kind of tectonic-of-textiles, e.g. a capability for elastic experience of space.  
The role of the SUB OBJECT is not to denote a specific function that it could have as an urban furniture or "passerella"; its main function is appearance as such, the cognisance that something comes into being.
In that sense its interpretation as a MONUMENT in the waters of Venice would be a reflection of its real nature – TOUCHING ET(H)ERNIT(Y)
Text: MBMHP = Minas Bakalcev + Mitko Hadji-Pulja

Vienna, September 9th, 2008

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