Brigitte Kowanz

Works

Since the 1980s, Brigitte Kowanz's work has focused on the investigation of space and light. At the beginning of this period, between 1979 and 1984, she produced paper and screen images with phosphorescent and fluorescent pigments in collaboration with Franz Graf. From 1984, Kowanz developed her first light objects from bottles, fluorescent lamps and fluorescent paint. Complex spatial images and light-shadow-projections were created using the simplest of means. However, light is not only a material, but also often a topic of Kowanz's works. For example, she has been engaged with the speed of light in a personal complex of works since 1989. A very small decimal number in neon figures indicates the time that the light needs to cover the length of this sequence of numbers. One complex of issues that Kowanz has also been engaged in since the 1980s is that of language and writing and its translation into codes. Light is investigated as a space-forming medium as well as an information carrier and medium of knowledge and visibility. Since 1995, Kowanz has also regularly used the morse alphabet – based on simple dash-dot combinations – for coding purposes. As a binary code, it represents the origin of the transfer of information using light. Kowanz uses (semi-)transparent glasses and mirrors, especially in her newer works. This leads to a diverse overlaying of the virtual and the real in her three-dimensional objects. The mutual reflection of light, language and mirror (Rainer Fuchs) produces hybrid spaces whose boundaries seem to be clearly defined at one moment, but gone again the next. Real space and virtual reflection penetrate each other, the boundaries between artwork and observer become fluid. The occupation with the intangible physics of light, which – although a guarantee of visibility – is itself slightly overlooked, persists in the works of Brigitte Kowanz to this day.

Awards

Exhibitions (selection)

Art in public space (selection)

Austria

International