pigment print, oil, lacquer and bleach on canvas
2015
The stream of images showing contemporary wars, crimes, massacres and catastrophes is omnipresent in today’s media. The pictures of the »Whitewashing«-cycle are an attempt at dealing with present-day reality – between representation and erasement and between symbolic salvation and suppression. The procedure of whitewashing expresses the hope to be able to distance oneself from the ugly, violent and negative, and reveals at the same time the failure of all such efforts. The »‘white« veils the depictions of cruelty, garbles them, and thus establishes a state of indifference, at the intersection of curiosity and repression. The reality of the images is seemingly covered and dissolved, they continue to exist in a strange twilight zone amidst white indifference and latent violence.

Michael Hirschbichler, WHITEWASHING, 2015

Michael Hirschbichler, WHITEWASHING, 2015

Michael Hirschbichler, WHITEWASHING, 2015

Michael Hirschbichler, WHITEWASHING, 2015

Michael Hirschbichler, WHITEWASHING, 2015

Michael Hirschbichler, WHITEWASHING, 2015

Michael Hirschbichler, WHITEWASHING, 2015

Michael Hirschbichler, WHITEWASHING, 2015

Michael Hirschbichler, WHITEWASHING, 2015