Flowers of a narration

2022, Marion Eisele/art historian, Düsseldorf

Translation: Enrico Nake

"On Monday or Tuesday no one answers, on Tuesday or Wednesday someone answers or calls back. On Thursday they were able to come together. Eternity is anticipated."

Connectivity issues, uncertainties, omissions, hesitance, waiting – already the path to a rendezvous is usually a highly sensitive matter. And the date itself even more so: through the protagonists’ quiet and loud emotions it has a unique, delicate atmosphere. Besides which is the background noise of the surroundings.

In a small rectangular vase on a table in front of a curtain stands the fresh sprig of a bellflower with five perfect blossoms. The English title of Thyra Schmidt’s coarsely rasterised, monochrome inked photograph of this arrangement is borrowed from the cited passage of the bilingual text panel: On Monday or Tuesday no one answers. Sometimes excitement, nonplus and further sensitive stirrings are paired with communication gaps, ambiguities and deviations of the translation. Every (visual) language has an individual tone, every translation a "dual connection": with the peculiarities of the source language on the one hand, and to those of the target language on the other hand.

Exactly how the flower portrait is related to the outlined events is not formulated. The artist lets us decide for ourselves whether the Campanulaceae, the Latin term for the 'little bell', is just a "silent observer" of the described interactions or a kind of representative object for the more or less successful telephone calls. Or is the flower’s presence perhaps even constitutive to the scenes?

The flower bouquets, together with the text panel elle that reproduces in writing a total of 24 self-authored snapshots, form the eleven-part silkscreen print series Rendezvous and thus a polyphonic unit of delicate impulses. In it, linear strands of events dissolve into fragments, in episodes from different and sometimes ambivalent perspectives. In the exhibition context, the audio recording of elle spoken by Thyra Schmidt creates another level of perception of the enigmatic connections.

Flowers are not only beautiful to look at, they are said to convey feelings and messages. However, in order for the bellflower to be interpreted as a symbol for “togetherness and unity” or “gratitude and recognition”, both sender and recipient need special knowledge. Yet even without this knowledge, it is generally true that flowers have always played a role as non-verbal carriers of meaning in various cultures.

In the New Kingdom of Egypt (1550 to 1070 BC), for example, the lotus stood for "resurrection and regeneration" – the sun god was born from a lotus flower. Accordingly, it was already a frequently used motif at that time and can be found, among other things, on tomb paintings in connection with offerings. The beginnings of Ikebana, the Japanese art of arranging flowers, which also arose in the course of a gift ritual – to the Buddhist and Shinto deities – go back as far as the 6th century. Not only as a sign of sacrifice, recognition and wealth, but also as a religious symbol, especially in the motifs of ephemeral objects. Representations of flowers have been found in art since antiquity: lily, columbine and iris for the purity of Mary; the baroque floral still life as a 'nature morte' and vanitas symbol. The Victorian language of flowers, which is still used today as a reference when it comes to (de-)cipherable flower messages, comes from an oriental tradition that the British writer Lady Mary Wortley Montagu (1689-1762) distributed to Europe in letters from her trip to Turkey in 1728: the harem ladies used certain types of flowers to communicate with the outside world.

Three lovers. Three rose branches of different lengths stand upright in a carafe, again in front of the curtain but closer to the edge of the table. This time the title of the orange-red photograph cannot be clearly assigned to a passage of text. Perhaps the "three lovers" belong to the intermezzo "Jealous looks from around the room"? After all, the flowers of love always have thorns.

The verbal descriptions have an indissoluble connection with the flower portraits that play with association and illustration, but can by no means be reduced to them. Like the sentences that are written in the present, but appear like distant or foreign memories in fragments, there is also a certain distance inherent in the photographs, which results from the abstraction through the raster and the inking. The chosen lighting assembly and compositions vary with each new flower and each new receptacle. But the close-drawn curtain always points back into the interior.

A small, dense bunch of short-stemmed carnations, freshly picked from the garden on a bright summer's day and placed in a simple drinking glass, was photographed at an angle from above. The pale burgundy print is titled 10, 9, 8, 7, ... – as if the blooming days were already numbered.

Thus, in the thicket of levels of meaning and interpretations, the cut flowers reflect the undertones of personal communication perhaps better than words. After all, sentiments and frames of mind go back less to logical arguments and objective causal chains than to perception and comprehension.

"Come over! – says the child to the marionette and seizes one hand. Holding the strings the puppeteer follows the two", is another passage of the artistic prose. Or elsewhere: "Conversations drift through the half opened window. Children hide their charred mascot in the cellar." Non-living things are also significant for our soul life and our bonds. Beloved everyday objects express emotions and especially affection.

Thyra Schmidt's precisely formulated sequences have narrative moments, but without actually telling a whole story. Rather, they bring to mind images in our heads and stimulate our emotional receptors, so that a few words can evoke a feeling or a memory or a very personal film can be played out – depending on how much we find ourselves in the lines and how much time we spend with this rendezvous.

Flowers of a narration

2022, Marion Eisele/art historian, Düsseldorf

Translation: Enrico Nake

"On Monday or Tuesday no one answers, on Tuesday or Wednesday someone answers or calls back. On Thursday they were able to come together. Eternity is anticipated."

Connectivity issues, uncertainties, omissions, hesitance, waiting – already the path to a rendezvous is usually a highly sensitive matter. And the date itself even more so: through the protagonists’ quiet and loud emotions it has a unique, delicate atmosphere. Besides which is the background noise of the surroundings.

In a small rectangular vase on a table in front of a curtain stands the fresh sprig of a bellflower with five perfect blossoms. The English title of Thyra Schmidt’s coarsely rasterised, monochrome inked photograph of this arrangement is borrowed from the cited passage of the bilingual text panel: On Monday or Tuesday no one answers. Sometimes excitement, nonplus and further sensitive stirrings are paired with communication gaps, ambiguities and deviations of the translation. Every (visual) language has an individual tone, every translation a "dual connection": with the peculiarities of the source language on the one hand, and to those of the target language on the other hand.

Exactly how the flower portrait is related to the outlined events is not formulated. The artist lets us decide for ourselves whether the Campanulaceae, the Latin term for the 'little bell', is just a "silent observer" of the described interactions or a kind of representative object for the more or less successful telephone calls. Or is the flower’s presence perhaps even constitutive to the scenes?

The flower bouquets, together with the text panel elle that reproduces in writing a total of 24 self-authored snapshots, form the eleven-part silkscreen print series Rendezvous and thus a polyphonic unit of delicate impulses. In it, linear strands of events dissolve into fragments, in episodes from different and sometimes ambivalent perspectives. In the exhibition context, the audio recording of elle spoken by Thyra Schmidt creates another level of perception of the enigmatic connections.

Flowers are not only beautiful to look at, they are said to convey feelings and messages. However, in order for the bellflower to be interpreted as a symbol for “togetherness and unity” or “gratitude and recognition”, both sender and recipient need special knowledge. Yet even without this knowledge, it is generally true that flowers have always played a role as non-verbal carriers of meaning in various cultures.

In the New Kingdom of Egypt (1550 to 1070 BC), for example, the lotus stood for "resurrection and regeneration" – the sun god was born from a lotus flower. Accordingly, it was already a frequently used motif at that time and can be found, among other things, on tomb paintings in connection with offerings. The beginnings of Ikebana, the Japanese art of arranging flowers, which also arose in the course of a gift ritual – to the Buddhist and Shinto deities – go back as far as the 6th century. Not only as a sign of sacrifice, recognition and wealth, but also as a religious symbol, especially in the motifs of ephemeral objects. Representations of flowers have been found in art since antiquity: lily, columbine and iris for the purity of Mary; the baroque floral still life as a 'nature morte' and vanitas symbol. The Victorian language of flowers, which is still used today as a reference when it comes to (de-)cipherable flower messages, comes from an oriental tradition that the British writer Lady Mary Wortley Montagu (1689-1762) distributed to Europe in letters from her trip to Turkey in 1728: the harem ladies used certain types of flowers to communicate with the outside world.

Three lovers. Three rose branches of different lengths stand upright in a carafe, again in front of the curtain but closer to the edge of the table. This time the title of the orange-red photograph cannot be clearly assigned to a passage of text. Perhaps the "three lovers" belong to the intermezzo "Jealous looks from around the room"? After all, the flowers of love always have thorns.

The verbal descriptions have an indissoluble connection with the flower portraits that play with association and illustration, but can by no means be reduced to them. Like the sentences that are written in the present, but appear like distant or foreign memories in fragments, there is also a certain distance inherent in the photographs, which results from the abstraction through the raster and the inking. The chosen lighting assembly and compositions vary with each new flower and each new receptacle. But the close-drawn curtain always points back into the interior.

A small, dense bunch of short-stemmed carnations, freshly picked from the garden on a bright summer's day and placed in a simple drinking glass, was photographed at an angle from above. The pale burgundy print is titled 10, 9, 8, 7, ... – as if the blooming days were already numbered.

Thus, in the thicket of levels of meaning and interpretations, the cut flowers reflect the undertones of personal communication perhaps better than words. After all, sentiments and frames of mind go back less to logical arguments and objective causal chains than to perception and comprehension.

"Come over! – says the child to the marionette and seizes one hand. Holding the strings the puppeteer follows the two", is another passage of the artistic prose. Or elsewhere: "Conversations drift through the half opened window. Children hide their charred mascot in the cellar." Non-living things are also significant for our soul life and our bonds. Beloved everyday objects express emotions and especially affection.

Thyra Schmidt's precisely formulated sequences have narrative moments, but without actually telling a whole story. Rather, they bring to mind images in our heads and stimulate our emotional receptors, so that a few words can evoke a feeling or a memory or a very personal film can be played out – depending on how much we find ourselves in the lines and how much time we spend with this rendezvous.