photographs of beautifully tattooed, young man wearing motorcycle helmets. Here and there, Dornbracht’s clients did a double take – but he and his wife enjoyed themselves…

DD: So there wasn’t any underlying obligation to create something that really would function as advertising material?

RL: Well, of course. We do live in capitalism – and Meiré and Meiré is, after all, one of the top-earning advertising firms. It was all about trying to create a different kind of image, and having the kind of success that, say, Levis has with its jeans fleet and small stores. Over the last six years, they’ve made a complete turnaround with their image – and it really works.

DD: What still interests me is something directly related to that: how do the different survival and marketing strategies function, in the case of someone who works as a musician on the one side, and makes gallery-oriented work on the other. Does that have an effect on…

RL: …on one’s bank account?

DD: Yes, on the bank account – but also on what one actually does, and on how one feels when

confronting one’s own product. The music that people might listen to while traveling, which connects them to their personal memories, is one thing; a collector’s item that goes on the shelf, or on a wall, is something else. Regarding the reception, or one’s own production, aren’t there many different, related references to be considered, including the financial as well as trade-related and emotional references? It would interest me to know, in every respect, how these two worlds relate to one another…

RL: My gallerist abandoned the idea of ever making money on my work ages ago. Now we have a different relationship: he likes what I do, and with his limited knowledge of music, he somehow values my work. In the end, he knows that when I have an exhibition, I’m filling the slot for another artist, someone who paints or photographs, and whose works really would sell. Nevertheless, he allows me the space and time for my work. On the art market, I’m as good as nonexistent at the moment. Of course, you do find collectors or museums that buy an installation now and then, which happens so rarely! Carsten Nicolai, who I know well, sold many of his works; he moves on a completely