Southwesten

Our latest and most elaborate project: the tapestry “Southwesten”, or “Print now – Riot later: The story so far”. We were able to realise this six-colour screen-printed tapestry thanks to a project grant from the Hessische Kulturstiftung (Hessian Cultural Foundation), for which we applied in autumn 2020 – a very big and heartfelt thank you to all the staff of this foundation. We are very happy that we were able to take advantage of this financial support for our complex project. When we were brainstorming during the application process – right in the middle of the Corona pandemic – we quickly agreed that this work should be something special, and so we decided on a “visual autobiography”. The last few years have been very intense and eventful for us: from 2014 to 2019 we lived and worked in the desert town of Tucson in the American Southwest (hence the dual-language title), but since mid-2019 we have been back in Frankfurt and have set up our own workshop here in nearby Maintal. On our wall hanging, we put together precious memories, moments and turning points from our lives over the last few years and collage scenes and stations from both sometimes very contrasting areas of life. Briefly about the work process: after it had become clear which scenes were to be depicted, we created drafts independently of each other, which were discussed, refined or discarded – a long but essential process. Parallel to this, various mood boards were created that would later help us with the scenic arrangement. In order to establish a close connection to Tucson (after all, the founding location of Print now – Riot later), we used a section of the city map of the downtown area there with its clear demarcations as a graphic grid. Both of us are drawn to the style of the 50s and 60s and it was quickly clear that we would choose the Midcentury formal language as the aesthetic superstructure for our wall hanging: flowing, organic curves and reduced-geometric forms interwoven with a contemporary context in terms of content. The wall hanging was screen printed in May 2021 in three colour variations and is expected to be exhibited in a Frankfurt art space in June 2021, depending on the current pandemic situation. We explain the individual scenes depicted in detail on our Instagram account. Website Hessiche Kulturstiftung Instagram Print now – Riot later