KMM Cultural Center

"As a cultural center dedicated to the historical relationship between sounds, people and machines, the KMM offers an inspiring environment for us as a contemporary sound artist duo. We want to be inspired by the sounds and the precise technology of the exhibits."

Inspired by the mechanical sophistication of the music machines, the contemporary sound artist duo will work with the records in the museum. The polyphonic records function as resonating bodies in which they reproduce the surrounding sound fragments from the room and form their own composition. As a formally reduced sound sculpture, this installation will provide a counterpoint to the opulent and powerful fairground and concert organs that dominate the large organ hall and stood for pleasure and wealth in their day. When is listening to music productive? Are there productive or unproductive sounds? The audience is invited to engage with the subtle nature of this experimental sound installation and to accept the offer of unproductivity.

Andreas Thiele was born in 1963 in Braunschweig in northern Germany. He has lived and experienced culture in Bonn, Freiburg i. Br., Berlin, Cologne and Aachen. After studying chemistry, he completed his PhD with engineers in the field of plastics recycling. The sunny earthling has lived in Uster for 19 years and has been creating sculptures, pictures and installations from used plastic packaging in his studio in the Zeughausareal K2 OG for years. In addition to his family, triathlon is his great passion. His main job is CTO at the artist paint manufacturer Lascaux Colours & Restauro.

Collect, sort, recycle, design and dispense with waste What do we do with all the plastic packaging that falls into our hands every day? The artist Andreas Thiele invites you to his studio to add value to plastic waste: collect it and bring it with you to process it at cozy and sociable meetings. How (un)productive is that? The cartography of the collected waste and the works created from the recycling are visible in the window of the optician's store "Sichtkontakt" in Wetzikon.

Museum Neuthal Textile and Industrial Culture

"My work often combines traditional weaving techniques with modern materials and technologies to subvert expectations and challenge assumptions about what constitutes 'feminine' art. My main focus is on exploring the intersection of feminism and textiles. Exhibiting works that are in dialog with a history rooted in the local economy gives my work a deeper meaning." (original quote in English)

Angèle Challier Fontaine's works reflect on the economic and social conditions of traditionally read women's occupations in the textile industry and the resulting gender dynamics. In her work, she takes a more critical look at historical economic structures during industrialization and honors the unpaid and hidden value that women contributed through their work in domestic and industrial spaces. The installation is a compilation of traditional embroidery and sewing and incorporates traditional techniques as exhibited in the Textile Museum Neuthal.

Museum Wetzikon

"Museums were created with the idea of telling cultural history and providing access to the past through objects. This is not a neutral gesture, but is also linked to the construction of identity and the establishment of a hierarchical structure between the self and the other. I am particularly interested in how these narratives are created through staging and context and how they can be critically questioned. This also results in a kind of paradox between my enthusiasm for things and the need to take a critical stance towards them."

To explore the idea of (in)productivity, the artist will consider the act of labor that an object performs in its specific exhibition context. The artist will work with the curators of all partner museums to select objects from each collection and give them some 'time off', so to speak. Each object will be exhibited in a different museum to break its conventional value in that specific context.

Ritterhaus Bubikon

"Nina and I have been exploring stories, wishes and fragments in our work together for a long time. We are delighted to be working in this context in the chapel of the Ritterhaus Bubikon, which tells an eventful story, from one faith to another. Nowadays, the place can no longer fulfill its function as a chapel for church services, which gives us the unique opportunity to fill this space with new, old and past stories." (Supported by the Aargauer Kuratrium, Gwärtler Stiftung, Wali Dad Stiftung, Anne-Marie Schindler Stiftung, Elisabeth Weber Stiftung and Musikschule Zürcher Oberland (MZO)

Leonie Brandner and Nina Guo devote themselves to the musical and performative representation of feelings associated with inactivity, excessive demands and overwhelm. How do we help ourselves to deal with these feelings? How do we move from perceived unproductivity back to productivity? How do we develop a healthy attitude towards our own productivity and can healing medicine help us with this? The two artists work along the overarching values and desires of the mandrake and create a comprehensive listening and viewing experience in the chapel of the Ritterhaus Bubikon.

Open Youth Work Wetzikon

"What are young people's expectations of leisure time and what aesthetics does adolescence conceal? In my artistic work, I explore kitsch, cuteness and gimmicks. As a counterpart to established art, I open up a pleasurable and participatory process with the young people, which first leads to abstraction and very close to the material. Depth and surface boil in the same sweet soup."

Miriam sets up her temporary studio in the premises of the open youth work center in Wetzikon during the festival and invites young people to participate in the work as observers or collaborators. The work is process-oriented and asks, among other things, what advantages a joint creative process brings and what potential individual and collective creativity enables. As an artist, Miriam contextualizes her methods and experiences and shares them with the audience in the context of the Kunstlokal. The artist wants to inspire with her working methods and allow herself and the participants to follow their own creative urge.

Museum Neuthal Textile and Industrial Culture

"I have always been interested in the interface between man and machine. I see myself as a designer who wants to achieve appealing results through justifiable decisions. Within the framework of an installation and through the methodology of creative coding, I want to define guidelines for the machine, but grant it certain freedoms and free time within the framework of the festival. A discourse between precision and human interpretation."

Philipp Lehmann's work focuses on the productive and creative potential of machines. He draws the museum visitors and portrays them in their own style. The pre-programmed nature of the machine defines the way in which the human image is interpreted and technically depicted. Philipp Lehmann is currently working on the graphic realization and testing the installation on various occasions. What role do we humans play in the production chain when the machine becomes creative? Is co-creation possible? We'll test it out with you.

Museum am Pfäffikersee

"A central theme of the Museum am Pfäffikersee is working from home. The precarious conditions and material hardship of historical reality are contrasted and at the same time combined with the longing of "leisure subjects" in late capitalism. The walk through the museum rooms evokes many parallels to YouTube tutorials, the topics of which are also represented in the museum's collection. I would like to explore these virtual and museum-like private spaces of working from home."

This work deals with the amateur maker at a time when DIY (do-it-yourself) culture is a growing space for creativity and accessibility. The approximately three-minute video is a montage of YouTube found-footage material. A kind of l'art-pour-l'art dream world is created through experimental alienation, duplication, exaggeration and repetition.

Ritterhaus Bubikon

"Site-specific works have been part of my artistic practice for years. Looking at what is there and reacting to it is what interests me. In this case, I came with an existing project idea. So there is an overlap between the museum and my world of ideas. In terms of content and form. Friction arises, at best." (Photography ©Thomas Burla)

"Lifestyle Bullshit" is a research project that focuses on the Western Union logo and has been running since 2015. Spieser plays with the company's brand identity and works on textiles and goods to imitate the brand colors (black and yellow). In the continuation of this project, the artist will make further connections between production flow, working hours and money in relation to the Ritterhaus in Bubikon. The work will include an installation presenting a kiosk with lifestyle bullshit products for sale to the public.