Fachstelle

A block of 500 pages of A4 paper corresponds to a basic unit in everyday office life: a single pack of photocopying paper, a brick. Michael Günzburger's book consists of over five hundred drawings on letterhead from the Canton of Zurich: concentrated, reduced, almost calligraphic sketches of other works from the Canton's art collection. moreGünzburger's drawings are a kind of virtuoso exercise: an artistic idea is extracted from each work and illustrated in a few strokes with black ink, a single phrase or an aphorism. Here, speed and consistency lead to a kind of abstraction. Sculptural works, portraits, abstract paintings – everything is captured in a readable sequence of economic gestures. They become comparable with each other, but also lose their specific characteristics and all the material qualities that make them works of art and not signs. With the inventory of the works on the letterhead of the canton, Günzburger also draws a portrait of the “Fachstelle Kunst” (which, however, never existed under this name), thus providing insight into the essence of bureaucracy. With a text by Adam Japser.