27. august – 25. september 2010
In his first solo show at Karma International entitled Multiplex, Emanuel Rossetti (*1987, lives in Basel and Zurich) combines three different bodies of work, the earliest one of which is a series of photographed stones dating from 2007 until today. The documented foundlings originally stem from glaciers, then have been moved by the melting process and were subsequently placed within the city’s landscape for aesthetic or practical reasons. The practice of tracking down and pinpointing movement and decontextualisation is inherent in Rossetti’s work. His new pieces further illustrate the complex character of Rosetti’s body of work:
Three new films (2010) shown on flatscreens in the gallery. Each of them is composed
in the same way: the artist assembled self-drawn models using the computer programme google sketch-up and complemented them by pre-existing found elements. The viewer follows dolly shots in three-dimensional postmodern architectural settings. These pavilions with their ephemeral status are found in between inside and outside zones. They are the starting points for a whole set up of a world which itself is displayed as a transparent, three-dimensional structure in which the inside and the outside merge. The artist places humans, plants, furniture and different elements of art and design within the architectural setting. The furniture and artworks are often direct references to influential corner pillars in Rossetti’s work practice, from Italian
designer Ettore Sottsass to Swiss artist Fabian Marti. Rosetti includes his own works and concepts of ideas in the models as well: One element that appears repeatedly in the films is the wallpaper which also makes up the third part of Mulitplex . This work is a collaboration between Emanuel Rossetti and Thomas Julier. Together they developed various patterns for specific
places or contexts of display. Regardless of the original setting the patterns can be re- used in different places bearing their origin in the title. The wallpaper covering the two outside walls of the Karma International space is titled Tblisi Pattern I (2010) and has been designed as a pink version for a public space in Tblisi, Georgia. Later on it was shown in a group show at Modern Institute in Glasgow and now has found its
analogy as a Zurich version in yellow and green.
Multiplex, with its various formal and contextual layers refers to a plural character of
perception, like in a multiplex-cinema, where in different halls a multitude of images
and illusions can be perceived at the same time. Rossetti’s ability of displaying
elements accurately and unerringly within a space (be it the gallery or the virtual
space in the films) echoes his longtime curatorial practice as one of the founders
of the offspace New Jerseyy in Basel.