Andreas Fogarasi: Weinstadt, Bierstadt, Wasserstadt
Lombardi – Kargl, Vienna
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Andreas Fogarasi’s artistic palette is the city. He roams the urban landscape attentively, searching for his materials. He collects relics of urban transformation processes – façade elements, windows, tiles, and stone slabs from buildings and public spaces. In his studio, he then combines what he finds into sculptural wall pieces in which urban identities and stories are condensed.
Andreas Fogarasi created the first drawing from the “Cities” series for an exhibition about Egon Schiele and contemporary art. The curator hoped he would focus on researching Vienna modernism, but instead, Fogarasi considered the contemporary touristic commodification of art and artists. He ended up making a simple pencil drawing of the word “Schielestadt” (The Schiele City). In the end, he didn’t exhibit the drawing or even show it to the curator. However, two years later, he continued the series, turning it into an ongoing exploration and speculation on the identities of places.