Place your hand on the table, spread your fingers, take a knife, and stab— as fast as you can—into the spaces in between. No risk, no fun.
In his multimedia exhibition at Bildraum 01, Michael Heindl opens up a space for action in which the meaning of things can be reinterpreted as part of economic, social, and symbolic processes. Knife Game with the Invisible Hand presents three recent series of works that address the destructive consequences of the capitalist system. Heindl makes the remnants of these excesses visible, but deliberately chooses to go beyond mere documentation. He does not wish to resign in the face of devastation. Rather, through his work, the artist seeks to establish a new point of departure by deconstructing the collected fragments and then reassembling them. Old orders are dissolved to make room for the new.
In Windshield Diamonds, Michael Heindl stages insects adorned with shards of car glass from accident sites, placing them on model car pedestals. This reconfiguration of relics—recalling practices of taxidermy—transforms the dead bodies into seemingly enduring, auratically charged objects. The insects, killed by passing cars, are thus not only aesthetically and visually elevated but also take the place of humans and vehicles at the center of attention.
A cinematic portrait of a forest area in Ehrenfeld, Upper Austria—cleared in December 2021 as part of one of the region’s largest deforestation projects—forms the second group of works in the exhibition. In From Something to Nothing, the artist animates 3,000 photographic images of the unique bark patterns of those trees that were later destroyed, creating a frame-by-frame video piece. The deliberate use of abstraction instead of a documentary-realistic narrative produces both irritation and emotional resonance, opening up new possibilities for interpretation and perspectives.
With God Helps Winners Only, Michael Heindl once again places human beings at the center. In public spaces in Chicago and New York, he found and collected discarded cardboard signs from people begging. He then dismantled the signs and recomposed the individual letters into anagrams. The resulting messages echo slogans of proponents of capitalist and neoliberal economic ideologies, exposing the cynicism of the underlying moral frameworks.
At Bildraum 01, Michael Heindl creates an experiential space from which new perspectives on the relationship between humans, the environment, and loss can emerge.