Klaus, vom Bruch
«Radar Shelves»

Klaus vom Bruch created these radio images, stored in this 4 x 4 m large and 1,20 m deep set of industrial shelves, in 9 places in Germany that are highly significant both historically and culturally: the Dessau Bauhaus, Schloß Sansoucci in Potsdam, Luther‘s Schloßkirche in Wittenberg, the Paulskirche in Frankfurt/M., Aachen Cathedral (Video excerpt), the V1 rocket site near Penemünde, the Einstein Tower in Potsdam, Goethe‘s summerhouse in Weimar and the Villa Hügel in Essen. Radar is usually used as a military image production strategy to make invisible things visible and to remain invisible oneself. Here the artist is working with a counter-strategy, and blurring the all-too-familiar: the 'Radar Shelves' show a panorama of indeterminate places by making it impossible to see them directly, in a way that can be identified. From the monitor to monitoring, to surveillance: visitors are reminded of the generation of information and media technology by military use.

Rudolf Frieling