Herbert De Colle: Emotion

Viennese artist Herbert De Colle approaches both exhibition and public spaces by means of a similar strategy. His poster projects, placed in urban public space, announce fictional concerts by the likes of Charles Manson—while in fact bands like Franz Ferdinand, for example, might be playing the venue that day—thereby engaging in a targeted way with the perception of public space and time. His installation practice takes a similar approach. Photographic portraits of his queer-influenced circle of friends combine collectively experienced pop- and fan-culture with what has long since become commercialized symbols of the American hippie movement. Often taking the form of cut-outs in multilayered motifs arranged like a wall of posters, De Colle employs peace or yin-yang symbols in different variations. Here too, counterculture and mainstream exist in an intricate dialogue full of contradictions. With his interventions, De Colle places himself like a kind of time traveler at the center of a pop-cultural as well as political turning point—the end of ‘68 and its neoliberal aftertaste—which he runs through again and again in different variations.
Text: Hannes Ribarits

hoast is an independent artist run project space in Vienna that intents to work on the relationship between the international and the local art scene. Furthermore hoast offers an infrastructure for various projects and initiatives that are passionately committed to current issues in art and society.