Untitled #5 (Goofy) 2008 / 2009

LIQUID SKY. SUPER IMPOSED.

The trained artist Eva Castringius sets new standards in staged photography with her photo series Liquid Sky. Super Imposed (2008), which playfully plumbs the tensions between painting and photography. Castringius’ explorations have their basis in her highly complex painting. “I am interested in the combination of architecture and landscape in the sense of the pervasion of interior and exterior. I create depth in the visual space, intermingle different visual elements and juxtapose the fluid with the fixed.”

The foundation of Castringius’s motifs comes from her extensive experiences in the cities and landscapes of the American West. Her dealings with urban culture are inspired by the revolutionary writings of Mike Davis, whose principal book City of Quartz: Excavating the Future in Los Angeles brilliantly and critically analyzes the glitzy city’s complex structure.

In the series Liquid Sky. Super Imposed Castringius stages her image worlds in colored artificial light. Not only the title of the series but also the lively fantasy in her subcultural elements recall the 1982 cult film Liquid Sky by Slava Tsukerman, which became a central aesthetic statement for the New Wave era. In her photographs she pairs dazzling neon in yellow, red, and blue with small gimmicks from America's pop culture – such as a pink plastic flamingo – and in doing so carries the viewers off into a magic world.

The works show an arranged world of light tubes, geometric shapes, and small figures. Reflections, warping, fractures, and overlaps allow abstract spaces to emerge that stand out in their particular depth. The collage-like interconnections of the various visual elements that Castringius positions allow the individual figures to become actors, fantastically charging the surrounding space. The double exposure technique, which the artist knowingly implements in her works, injects the work with an unpredictable element. She aims for the tension created by the combination of accidental and intended visual elements.

The experimental and theatrical character of Castringius’s works recalls the photo, film, and light installations of the Bauhaus, in particular of those by artist Lászlo Moholy-Nagy. She pairs constructivist elements with California neon and combines her cultural-aesthetic experiences in the US with those in Europe. As such, Castringius’s works can be understood in the framework of a contemporary artistic trend influenced by West Coast art, whose most important proponents include Bruce Nauman, Mike Kelley, and Ed Ruscha.

Horst Kloever