Intervallo: System Insect Control

Nov. 14, 2019

7:00 p.m. Frei.Raum

Heinz Mader

>>> Italian t.v. originally used "Intervallo" as a broadcasting sign-off. It included very calming harp music as images from works of the Italian Renaissance were shown. Nowadays, we are accustomed to hearing pieces by Mozart, Vivaldi, Bach, or jazz while waiting "on hold." And works of art are very frequently employed in screen-savers. And in buses, train stations, shopping centers, bars, and elsewhere, we are flooded with images.

>>> These various "interstitial realms" have motivated me to think about what is actually going on here. I have begun sketching, painting, and writing in a telephone book with the intention of producing a video film. On the basis of the resulting 523 pages, my friend Jürgen Winkler composed music completely independently of my direction and used the rhythm of the images to create a film.

>>> The interruption of time in the form of leisure time – i.e., a time free of obligations – is the input for my playful and creative treatment as a latent prisoner of time in favor of absolute freedom.

Jürgen Winkler

In his telephone book pictures, Heinz painted the words "system" and "insect control."

I was inspired by the combination of words in context and called it "System Insect Control." This name echoes today's flood of digital processing – which has long since made printed phone books obsolete. It's a controlling system looming over us all in which the importance of the individual "apparently" drops towards zero and he mutates into an insect in an unfathomable insect world.