Spring in Vienna, royal chaos and a jewish preacher

The project “Royal Chaos” departs from the Gestalt psychological term “supersummativity”, which is, the concept that the total is more than the sum of its parts. Cognition and perception are based on complex relationships that are impossible to explain just by analyzing individual parts. By weaving different layers of images together, the project creates a multi-dimensional experience through moving form and color that allows the pictures to come alive. Thus, a journey of the mind begins for the observer who encounters this series, where what is recognizable is suspended and the viewer finds him or herself entangled in a visually distorted world, where subjective emotional responses offer the only form of orientation.

For this exhibition, Bernhard Musil used the photographic technique of double exposure to engender controlled chaos. Musil references aesthetic principles from the history of art: referencing Italian Mannerism, the artist works against well-balanced composition or ideal harmony by passionately exaggerating forms. Pointing to the Habsburg Baroque, the various images combine to create a total work of art, an orgiastic interaction of different disciplines whose borders are smudged. Indeed, each image in this series is created with up to thirty different photographic layers that are brought together using multiple techniques. Some elements are immediately recognizable, while others take more time to see. Musil combines photographs from unrelated fields and eras, but mainly focuses on religion, fashion and the erotic, while incorporating urban impressions, geometrical structures as well as reproductions of classical paintings and historical documentation.

The basic principle behind Musil's work is highlighting the complexity of everyday experiences: chains of thoughts and impressions that accompany one on his or her way to work, when taking a walk, or while watching television—these experiences vary along the range of subjectivities. Such mental images reflect daily, semi-conscious experiences as well as flows of emotions and reflections, together impossible to articulate fully in their complexity. These pictures attempt to visualize such subjective interiority. For each and every one of us, our internal stream of images are idiosyncratically interlinked and difficult to break down, separate and categorize, as if each were a single snapshot. Instead, one experiences life as an interplay - each trajectory of movement propelled by individual experiences, associations and moods.

Encountering these images, the pieces appear as a static entity, yet the degree of movement embedded within each stimulates a range of imaginations, sensations, and observations, depending on the viewer’s mood and circumstance. Rather than dictating one particular “way of seeing”, the images offer a totality of individual associations, a matrix for numerous ways of seeing, a composite multiplicity of subjective visions.

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Vernissage:
TAKE Festival for Independent Fashion and Arts
25th-29th April 2017

Adress: Alte Post, Dominikanerbastei 9-11, 1010 Wien

Tickets online: take-festival.com/tickets

born 1980 in Klagenfurt/Austria
studied communication science and publishing at University of Vienna and visual mediadesign at the University of Applied Arts Vienna
Started 2000 assisting several photographers in Vienna, such as Oliver Ottenschläger, Inge Prader, Markus Morianz, Marcel Gonzales, Oliver Gast and Joe Fish

After several temporary employments abroad (Miami, Milan, London) he moved 2005 to Berlin, which is still his current base

www.be-musil.com

Karma und Piloten
Elias Paurnfeindt Eyss
Florian-Geyer-Str. 8
81377 München

kontakt@karmaundpiloten.de
www.karmaundpiloten.de

T. 0049-89-2000681-68
F. 0049-89-2000681-11

This release was published on openPR.