UnWorlding (Saliera), 2024
mixed-media 2-channel video installation (full HD, color, stereo sound, 15:28 min.) salt, recycled wooden logs, tree branches.
Benvenuto Cellini’s Saliera (1540–43), an elaborate salt cellar featuring juxtaposed allegories of Earth and Sea, was stolen in 2003 from the Kunsthistorisches Museum and hidden in a forest near Vienna. Benera and Estefan recast it as an actual salt block and once again placed it in the woods, where it dissolves under animal tongues and shifting weather conditions. In the exhibition space, the salt version is displayed in a makeshift forest that visitors can wander through, much like the deer in the accompanying video documentation.
The work delves into the intricate relationship between the over-exploitation of forests and salt mining in the Salzkammergut region of the Styrian Alps, where historically, salt resources were highly prized, often referred to as 'white gold'.
This project was commissioned by KunstHausWien for the Klima Biennale 2024 and realized in collaboration with the Austrian Federal Forests.
photocredits Thomas Kranabitl/ Österreichische Bundesforste annd Joanna Pianka / eSel
mixed-media 2-channel video installation (full HD, color, stereo sound, 15:28 min.) salt, recycled wooden logs, tree branches.
Benvenuto Cellini’s Saliera (1540–43), an elaborate salt cellar featuring juxtaposed allegories of Earth and Sea, was stolen in 2003 from the Kunsthistorisches Museum and hidden in a forest near Vienna. Benera and Estefan recast it as an actual salt block and once again placed it in the woods, where it dissolves under animal tongues and shifting weather conditions. In the exhibition space, the salt version is displayed in a makeshift forest that visitors can wander through, much like the deer in the accompanying video documentation.
The work delves into the intricate relationship between the over-exploitation of forests and salt mining in the Salzkammergut region of the Styrian Alps, where historically, salt resources were highly prized, often referred to as 'white gold'.
This project was commissioned by KunstHausWien for the Klima Biennale 2024 and realized in collaboration with the Austrian Federal Forests.
photocredits Thomas Kranabitl/ Österreichische Bundesforste annd Joanna Pianka / eSel