The Istituto Svizzero launches its exhibition program in Milan with a solo show of artist Dunja Herzog (Basel, 1976), on Friday, 20 September, at 6.30 p.m. on the occasion of STARTMilano and continues from 10.00 p.m. through to midnight with a party of the event, that brings together the contemporary art galleries and exhibition spaces of the city. The exhibition will be exclusively open also on Saturday, 21 September (2.00 – 8.00 p.m.) and Sunday, 22 September (2.00 – 6.00 p.m.)

The Industrial age and modern life concentrated in cities have brought a surplus production of objects in their wake. We are surrounded and swamped with objects, tools, prostheses, more than in any other time in history. Functional objects, everyday objects, disposable things. What is the value of all this for contemporary occidental society? What are the true functions of these things? What needs do they satisfy? How do they influence our everyday life? After a research that has led her to cross various cultures from the African Continent for many years, Dunja Herzog plunges back into the occidental world, assuming the viewpoint of things. She reassembles materials, mostly found by the wayside and in domestic places, and like a modern teller of fables she grants them a new existence. This exhibition is a world of creatures that we could define as hybrids – for lack of a more precise word – apparently fragile, without definite purpose, maybe useless, with no fixed abode and made of the refuse of our everyday existence. If anyone is willing to pay attention, they can come to life, and also speak. Usually, as in the case of Kafka’s Odradek, the conversation ends in laughter – but it is only the kind of laughter that has no lungs behind it. It sounds rather like the rustling of fallen leaves. Will anyone point out that the emperor has no clothes?