Nick Oberthaler’s artistic practice explores the function of abstract painting as a medium for visual and spatial experiences. His works refer to visual codes and parameters that Oberthaler borrows from visual theory, digital space and institutional contexts. For his exhibition in Bad Ischl as part of the Capital of Culture year, the artist has conceived a new series of works that refer to the city’s visual identity. Using the compositional methods of abstraction, he has created new paintings that interweave the modes of representation and design elements of flags with the processuality of painting.
As part of this exhibition, Nick Oberthaler has invited three of his former students from Lyon to develop new works on site that refer to the geographical and thematic focal points as well as the contextual framework of the Capital of Culture in the region.
Lise Lebleux works in the medium of acoustics mainly with field recordings and creates sound topologies of different spaces: each sound piece is the result and audiophonic recording of a specific and unique space with its present and given conditions. Her compositions have most recently been heard on radiophrenia, Glasgow, *Duu Radio, Paris and Montez Press Radio, New York. In 2023 she had her first institutional solo exhibition at Kunstverein Harburger Bahnhof, Hamburg-Harburg and in summer 2024 she will develop a new composition for ORF/Ö1 Kunstradio.
In her filmic and photographic practice, Clara Lemercier Gemptel places the construction of gender and identity as well as the relationship between architecture and the human body at the centre of her artistic exploration. For the exhibition in Bad Ischl, she has created a series of photographs that are dedicated to the theme of mining and thus refer to an essential aspect of the identity of the Salzkammergut. Her last short film TEAM SPIRIT was shown in the official selection of the Si cinema Festival at the Centre Pompidou, Paris. In autumn 2024, she will present a new film production at the 17th Lyon Biennale.
Ugo Sébastião is a painter and deals with material aspects of the panel painting and its nature in relation to (art) historical meaning, analysing and questioning the different technological conditions of painting such as support, ground, frame and installation. In 2022 he was part of the Artist in Residence programme at Palazzo Monti, Brescia and he had solo exhibitions at Alice Amati Gallery, London (2023) and pal project, Paris (2022).