Clegg & Guttmann

Drafts of functional unit

Clegg & Guttmann, Silent Walk, 2009.

Clegg & Guttmann, Silent Walk1, 2009.

Clegg & Guttmann, Silent Walk2, 2009.

Clegg & Gutmann, Silent Walk3, 2009.

Editions

Clegg & Guttmann, Certificates, 2009.

Clegg & Guttmann, Certificates, 2009.

Info

Silent Walk (2009), which Clegg & Guttmann suggested for ECHTWALD, transfers the potentials of their Cognitive Exercises, which they began developing in 2001, into nature, offering visitors the possibility of following performative “stage directions” as though on a theatre stage. In this particular case, the task is to hear rhythmically ordered sensory impulses and respond to them with movement. This creates an experiential space that heightens the senses and their perception of art and nature. The relationships between art and nature, observer and agent, actor and audience shift with every step the visitor takes.

About the artists

Born in 1957 in Dublin and Jerusalem respectively, they live and work in New York, Berlin, and Vienna.

Glegg & Guttmann began working together in 1980. Many of their joint projects were designed for public spaces. The most typical feature of their work is that active participation is a constitutive element of their artistic practice. They design models for communications, collaborations, and participations in political and cultural processes. One of their well-known projects is The Open Library, an installation consisting of freely accessible bookcases where visitors can add and remove books in an independent and autonomous book exchange system. The result is the social portrait of a community.