To put it briefly: Doris Erbacher plays with perception. Her artistic work is a consistent exploration of the intermediate areas, the correspondences between surface and line, image and frame, wall and space. She prefers simple materials and forms, which she investigates in serially arranged groups of works and in repetitive processes with minimal deviations. This results in new aspects being added, or there are references and connections to previously tried-and-tested techniques. Erbacher's works have a fundamental openness that defies clear definition. They are experimental and open-ended, employing the most minimal means. Ultimately, despite the diversity of materials used, Doris Erbacher is concerned with painting or the question of the image, albeit with a certain dominance of the linear or graphic. Erbacher consistently examines the line in its contradictory nature as form and separation in ever-new constellations. The minimalist, even concrete appearance of her works is counteracted by the handwriting, not-quite-right-angled – this, too, evokes the charm of her works, which fit into a labile equilibrium of controlled action and spontaneous gesture. Irritations arise again and again, for example when the seemingly three-dimensional image object turns out to be a flat surface upon closer inspection. Sometimes Erbacher emphasizes this moment by beveling the image carrier at the corners. It is also a play with the ambivalence of two- and three-dimensionality. The relative nature of her works is an essential characteristic.

What happens when two or even more of these image objects meet framed drawings, unframed paper works, and ceramic panels on the wall is demonstrated in the exhibition "framed unframed" at PORT25 – Raum für Gegenwartskunst. Seemingly random, loose compositions or concentrated, dense hanging result in ever-new correspondences and harmonies, and sometimes also unwieldy constellations. A vast field of discoveries, questions, and insights unfolds before the exhibition's visitors. Their movement in the space, the space itself, and the various viewing angles continually reveal new and sometimes surprising perspectives on the works. A focus of the exhibition "framed unframed" is directed towards the frame as a defining line or as a boundary. Usually, a frame separates the image and the surrounding space. When this characteristic and function is questioned and its aesthetic setting is scrutinized, the relationships between  image, frame, and wall are reordered. In Erbacher's latest series of works, the "frameworks" – painted paper strips assembled into modular frame-like structures – the frame is the painting, the wall is both the inner surface and the surrounding space. Here, too, Doris Erbacher aims at a fundamental theme of perception.

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Doris Erbacher, born in 1953, led the experimental "Kunstraum Erbacher" in Mannheim after studying at the Staatlichen Kunstakademie Stuttgart. From 1992, she worked as a filmmaker in Berlin. Since 2009, Doris Erbacher has been living back in the region and has had a studio in Mannheim since 2020.

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Events

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artist talks

Thursday, 06/15/2023 | 6 pm

framed – with Doris Erbacher and Kim Behm

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Sunday, 09.07.2023 | 3 pm

unframed – with Doris Erbacher and Kim Behm

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guides

Thursday, 06/29/2023 | 6 pm

Guided tour in Turkish with Melek Kilic

 

Sunday, 07/16/2023 | 3 pm

Guided tour in Russian with Anna Siebert

 

Sunday, 07/30/2023 | 3 pm

Guided tour in German with Kim Behm

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reading

Friday, July 28, 2023 | 7 pm

Reading with Nora Gomringer: “Nora Gomringer does the poem. Out of."

Admission 5 / 10 € (free with Kulturpass)

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concerts

Sunday, June 11, 2023 | 8 pm

electrosmog presents: Bryan Eubanks

Admission 5 / 10 / 15 € (box office)

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Sunday, July 02, 2023 | 8 pm

electrosmog presents: BRUINE

Admission 5 / 10 / 15 € (box office)