Hubertus v. Amelunxen

The insignia of media-technical apparatuses proliferate on the large-format Sources; in these macroscopic shots of image carriers, or rather information carriers, it seems at first glance that the sign-like message has been separated from that of the media, the carrier. It is as though we were seeing the purity of the physical material – the canvas – before us, overlaid with the enlarged epidermis of the physical-chemical or electronic carrier material. The enlargements of infographic carriers, of monitors, photocopies, printing, etc. make us aware of the ”place” that bears (away) the traces of our presence. Thus the carriers, to which we entrust the legacy of our presence, already bear a ”mark”, seem to be ”punctured”, injured, and do not correspond at all to the immaculacy of a surface, to which we sacrifice the dimensions of space.

In Günther Selichar's Sources, the ”source” has dried up, and yet the Sources enable us to suspect that there is something hidden behind the surfaces, something that surrounds us daily and that we need to save, reproduce and communicate. The Sources show that each and every media-technical apparatus bears that which is depicted into a ”sphere of principal otherness”, as Erwin Panofsky phrased it in the 1920's. Each reproduction bears the mark of this ”otherness” and thus generates a truly productive difference.

From: Hubertus von Amelunxen, On the Way Back to the Image, in: Hubertus von Amelunxen, Robert C. Morgan, Urs Stahel: Günther Selichar. Screens, cold. (Vienna: Triton, 2001).

Born 1960 in Linz (A)

Studies of art history and classical archeology at the University of Salzburg (A) and at the Art Institute of Chicago (USA).

Professor of Media Arts, Mass Media Research and Art in Public Media Space, Academy of Visual Arts (HGB), Leipzig (D).

• Auslandsstipendien des Bundeskanzleramtes in Rom 1989, Paris 1993, New York 1994, Fujino|Tokyo 2004 und London 2005/06.
• Förderungspreis der Salzburger Wirtschaft 1986.
• Würdigungspreis für Künstlerische Fotografie des Bundesministeriums für Unterricht und Kunst 1990.
• Anni und Heinrich Sussmann Stipendium 1994.
• Staatsstipendium für Künstlerische Fotografie 1997.
• Preis des Landes Vorarlberg, 25. Österreichischer Graphikwettbewerb Innsbruck 1997.
• Förderungspreis für Bildende Kunst der Stadt Wien 1997.
• Art|Omi - Residency New York 1998.
• Preis des Landes Oberösterreich, 27. Österreichischer Graphikwettbewerb Innsbruck 2001.
• Oberösterreichischer Landeskulturpreis für künstlerische Fotografie 2001.
• Ankaufspreis, 28. Österreichsicher Graphikwettbewerb Innsbruck 2003.
• Gaststipendium, Villa Stoneborough-Wittgenstein/Thomas-Bernhard-Archiv, Gmunden 2004.
• Würdigungspreis für Bildende Kunst der Stadt Linz 2004.

Works in national and international public and private collections.

Language: English