Gallery

Description

Lately, the sleek curved shape of a rollercoaster highlights widely visible the highest peak of the park that houses this intervention, the Heinrich Hildebrand Höhe in the South of Duisburg. The dynamic sweeps and curves of the construction inscribe themselves like a signature into the scenery and soar till the height of 21 meters. From a distance the metallic glossy track creates the impression of speed and exceeding acceleration. Viewed from close up, the supposed lane turns out to be a stairway which, , follows the course of the rollercoaster. The visitor can climb the art work by foot. Although the course describes a closed loop, it is impossible to accomplish it as the looping emerges to be a physical barrier. On top, at the highest point of the sculpture – 45 meters above ground – the visitor is rewarded with an extraordinary view over the landscape of the Western Ruhr.

Tiger and Turtle refers with its immanent dialectic of speed and deadlock to the situation of change in the region and its turn towards “renaturation” and restructuring. While the sculpture conveys an absurd twist regarding the inherent expectation of the image created by a rollercoaster, it reflects its own role as potential trans-regional landmark. It counters the logic of permanent growth with an absurd / contradictory sculpture that refuses a definite interpretation. With a 44 x 37 meters base and 21 meters construction height, the sculpture is not only one of the largest in Germany, but also a masterpiece of engineering.

Biography

For the last eight years that Heike Mutter and Ulrich Genth create together artistic projects in public space and exhibition venues. Their works are site-specifically and contextually developed, reflecting in a manifold way the conditions of being and experiencing public space . Since 2007 the artist duo lives and works in Hamburg where Heike Mutter holds professorship at the Hochschule für bildende Künste.