Maria Berauer – Artist in Residence
Maria Berauer`s work includes performances, videos, installations, sound art and actions in public space. The connecting element in her artistic practice is the body used as a tool as well as material and as a source of information and a means of self-expression. Based on questions about parameters of the human condition, she examines the varieties of human being and behavior with the body as access to the world. The body becomes the place of action and venue at the interface of aesthetic, political and ethical questions. Humour, self-mockery and grotesque exaggeration play an important role in her work and allow a critical distance to approach taboo and uncomfortable subjects with a wink.
Equally important to her individual work is the cooperation in artist collectives. In shared authorship, synergies are formed and a continuous process of opening and widening is possible, the search for new perspectives and horizons.
Fotos: Maria Berauer
During the one-month residency in Salzamt Linz Maria Berauer focused besides studio work on getting to know the lively art- and musicscene of the city. Her specific interest in artistic collaboration took her to various unique places. She visited frequently the tangible music lab at Tabackfabrik for lectures/concerts on post digital lutherie and exchanched with the artists and researchrs on the spot. At Raumschiff by the performance art collective Raumarbeiterinnen she was invited to take part in a performative network dinner and she visited various of-spaces, galleries and museums. In general Maria Berauer got the impression of a very welcoming and supportive community which made it possible to easily connect with local artists and cultural workers. These enriching encounters and also the meetings with the other international residents at Salzamt made the month a priceless experience and led to plans for future collaborations.
Thanks to the great openess and generousity of Salzamt`s hosts Maria Berauer invited her performance collective for a short visit to work on a new performance.
As a residency could be a special oportunity to step out of daily routine and create a distance to ingrained habits in the artistic work, Maria Berauer decided to take these specific circumstances to trying to initiate something completely different from her usual artistic practice. So she started a series of watercolour painings (Flamingos Malen!) and rediscovered practice of modelling by anatomically correct remodeling of human hearts. Maria Berauer experienced the change of the media/material and consequently of the artistic approaches as an opening moment to fresh fields, forms and ways of expressing and is looking forward to proceeding and developing them in the future.
The huge empty studio space inspired Maria Berauer in the end of the month to a video performance where she merged recent personal experiences of loosing and letting go with the moment of leaving again the place/the studio/the city.