Sabine Hornig: “The Matter of the Glazed Fence” at Cristina Guerra
Exhibition view of Sabine Hornig's show The Matter of the Glazed Fence. Courtesy of Cristina Guerra Contemporary Art © Vasco Stocker Vilhena.
A bell which tolls for a former faith in democracy and the people’s will rings in one’s head upon entering the gallery space of Cristina Guerra in Lisbon. Sabine Hornig’s works currently on view are indicative of our current historic moment, in which so many democratically elected governments across the globe are undermining the very substance of the civil contract between the elected and the electorate.
Yet the artist succeeds in creating an uneasy discourse on the nature of will, the shifting notion of boundaries, and the participant’s own position. That which we see in front of us has fluid potential to change meaning either aesthetically or mimetically, just as a viewer’s perspective changes when approaching Hornig’s works. A meandering sculpture at the center of the space, eight hanging ceramic silkscreen prints on glass, tripods at the lower parts of the gallery, or seven silkscreen and pigment prints on archival paper mounted on the walls confront the viewers with different textures and recontextualizations. A viewer wants to push beyond a subjective perception and geometric lines to understand the artist’s message, but Hornig is herself in the process of recalibrating this message. The ambiguity of today’s political reality forces us to rethink what has been taken for granted for many years, and this is what is being asked of us by the artist.
Exhibition view of Sabine Hornig's show The Matter of the Glazed Fence. Courtesy of Cristina Guerra Contemporary Art © Vasco Stocker Vilhena.
Throughout her artistic career, one of Hornig’s crucial concepts has consistently been the theme of transparency and doubling, not just an attribute of being the opposite of opaque, but a nuanced approach of looking at several layers to understand the full meaning of an image. The Matter of the Glazed Fence presents the artist’s idea of this optical construct. Ceramic silkscreen prints on glass such as Windows (2022), This is No Time (2022), and Stufen/Steps (2022) revisit La Guardia Vistas (2020), Hornig’s large-scale permanent installation at LaGuardia Airport, created in conjunction with the Public Art Fund.
In this large photographic work, as well as in the ceramic silkscreen prints currently presented at Cristina Guerra, we see a deconstructed New York skyline, one version of it erected ground-up, and a second superimposed from above, upside-down. On top of these deliberately abstracted urban landscapes are printed multicolored statements by the former New York mayor Fiorello La Guardia regarding migration, time, and war. La Guardia, who himself came from an immigrant background, was instrumental in creating spaces for equality and communities in a progressive and transformative way throughout the city. His idealistic quotes grace the prints in the gallery on view.
The simultaneity of viewpoints is the underlying intention of these works. In a way, it is a Nabokovian sentiment of the sum total of our past, present, and future when read in one linear, nonsequential manner.” A thin veneer of immediate reality is spread over natural and artificial matter, and whoever wishes to remain in the now, on the now, should please not break its tension film.”[1] This thought serves as an underlying aesthetic sensibility, while the artist’s engagement with the legacy of mayor La Guardia serves as her explicit commentary on the state of human rights and dignity in many democratic societies. Just as Nabokov is ruminating on the nuances of what should be seen versus what should be glanced through, so does Hornig look at the semi-transparent building walls wondering what is coming next.
Exhibition view of Sabine Hornig's show The Matter of the Glazed Fence. Courtesy of Cristina Guerra Contemporary Art © Vasco Stocker Vilhena.
Another constant for Hornig has been her reconfiguration of space, questioning what lies beyond apparent surfaces. Cristina Guerra’s gallery space is different from a regular white cube: it is a slightly oblong rectangle, proceeding to a lower level. Working with these specific parameters, Hornig was able to create micro-conversations in between works by continuing with the theme of participation and passivity. Wahlkabine (Voting Booth) (2024) occupies a special role in this exhibition. This abstract and grid-patterned voting booth was initially inspired by the balconies of Tbilisi. During the Georgian civil war of the 1990s, which marked the dissolution of the Soviet Union and unrest prompted by various groups fighting for dominance, citizens of Tbilisi had to create security in their homes, and metal balconies became extensions of living quarters but also protected against intruders by denying them entry.
Hornig first created an iteration of this sculpture in Tbilisi; a second was created in Berlin, then modified, and now brought to Lisbon in its third form. It is discomforting to see how the artist’s meditation on the nature of democracy and its transparency has shifted since the sculpture was shown for the first time in 2022 in Georgia. The structure consists of two identical rooms that can only be entered from opposite directions or looked at from the outside: a striking and to-the-point metaphor for our time of shifting systemic changes.
By combining sculpture and photography in experimental and symbolic ways, Hornig creates a moment to reconsider our discomfort with ambiguity and agency. If we want to make a change, it is up to us to take on the flag.
Exhibition view of Sabine Hornig's show The Matter of the Glazed Fence. Courtesy of Cristina Guerra Contemporary Art © Vasco Stocker Vilhena.
[1] Vladimir Nabokov, Transparent Things (New York: Vintage International, 1989), 2.
