16th of Nov - 31st of Dec 2023
Free admission
Joonas Lahtinen - Love Letters
Love Letters is an installation, a participatory experiment, a declaration of love to love letters and to the oeuvre of Jenny Holzer, with which the artist Joonas Lahtinen has been intensively engaging himself for several years. Quotations from Jenny Holzer and from cultural theory texts, a personal letter by Lahtinen to Holzer, and letters and messages written by the audience run on the ticker bars installed in the former telephone booth.
In their talk at the Opening on 16 November, the cultural theorist, curator and Professor Elke Krasny and Joonas Lahtinen will discuss art historical, cultural and sociopolitical contexts of love letters and of letter writing, the “confessional society”, politics of participatory art, and the relation between the “public” and the “private”, based on the installation. After the talk, the first love letters and messages by visitors will be integrated into the installation and displayed in public. (Event language: German)
Invitation for participation
Joonas Lahtinen invites the audience to display their own love letters – or, understood broadly, e.g. a fan letter or tribute to someone you admire – as part of the installation. You may sign your letter or send it anonymously. You may write the letter in the language of your choice. Maximal length of the letter is 500 characters.
How to participate:
You can send your letter text anytime via email at loveletters_project@gmx.at or insert it in the installation together with Joonas Lahtinen onsite on one of the following dates (no booking required):
- Thu, 16th of November 2023 at the Opening, after the Talk
- Thu, 30th of November 2023 between 6 pm and 7 pm
- Thu, 14th of December 2023 between 6 pm and 7 pm
A project by Christine Baumann and Pablo Chiereghin.
