Das Kunstwerk zeigt zwei bemalte, durchsichtige Glasplatten, die auf einem alten Metalltisch stehen und von einer Leuchtstoffröhre von hinten beleuchtet werden. Auf den Platten sind bunte, abstrakte Gesichter und Formen mit leuchtenden Farben, Mosaiksteinen und Symbolen wie Augen, Mund und Händen dargestellt.

Kerstin Brätsch

Holo mai Pele, Is it you or perhaps you? (Mund der Wahrheit) & Holo mai Poli’ahu; Facefold (Dritte Dame), 2012-2016

Translated titleHolo mai Pele, Is it you or perhaps you? (Mouth of Truth) & Holo mai Poli'ahu; Facefold (Third Lady)
MaterialLuster, enamel, and Schwarzlot on antique glass, drawn glass, rolled glass shards, glass jewels, agate slices, lead
Dimensions170 x 188 x 58 cm
Year of acquisition2018
Inventory numberUAB 1103
On viewOn view
Copyright© Kerstin Brätsch. Photo: Haydar Koyupinar, Bayerische Staatsgemäldesammlungen, Museum Brandhorst, Munich

More about the artwork

Since 2011, Kerstin Brätsch has been working with glass, a material that we often overlook even though it is ubiquitous—not least in the form of our smartphone touchscreens, which we use for much of our daily communication. But Brätsch deliberately decided against these industrially manufactured glass surfaces. Instead, she uses historic church-window trims, glass stones, and thin agate slices, which are fit into hand-painted antique glass panes with tin solder. She developed these works with the Swiss glass master Urs Rickenbach, who, according to Brätsch, “lends me his hands” as a trained craftsman. Illuminated from below, the glass works transform into ghostly pictorial bodies: the recesses render them into masks, knobby hands, and grimacing mouths and eyes. The display for these fragile compositions was designed by the artist duo Full-Fall.