Thomas Demand
Bullion
2003
c-print
Image: 27.7 × 27.7 cm | 10 7/8 × 10 7/8 in
Sheet: 30 × 30 cm | 11 3/4 × 11 3/4 in
verso on a label signed, dated, titled and "Edition 27/100" numbered
Edition of 100 + 15 a.p. Editor: Edition EN/OF, Kleve
Private Collection Rhineland
- Galerie Ludorff, "KUNST MACHT GLÜCKLICH", Düsseldorf 2023
- Galerie Ludorff, "KUNST MACHT GLÜCKLICH", Düsseldorf 2023, Nr. 55
- Christy Lange (Hg.), "Thomas Demand. The Complete Papers", London 2018, S. 184
- Hubertus Gassner/Martina Sitt (Hg.), "Spiegel geheimer Wünsche: Stillleben aus fünf Jahrhunderten", Ausst.-Kat. Hamburger Kunsthalle, München 2008, S. 35, Abb. S. 37
Thomas Demand moulds his world of motifs from small-scale paper and cardboard models, which he stages in elaborate montages to create seemingly real worlds, only to destroy them afterwards. What remains are photographs that bear witness to the artist's sculptural constructions. Demand is not interested in the ideal of mimesis, of skilful imitation. Rather, he reconstructs realities, such as places, things or concrete, historical events, in order to expose our increasingly media-mediated perception and its effects on our concept of reality.
"Bullion" (2003) shows a stack of gold bars, which - in keeping with Thomas Demand's modus operandi - is not made of pure gold, but of meticulously folded gold paper, although this cannot be seen with the naked eye. The paper illusion, which stylises itself into something valuable in the guise of gold, can also be understood as an implicit commentary on our understanding of value, which - in the form of the gold ingot - constantly shifts between meaning and form in our perception and is thus heightened to absurdity.
