andreas mares

featured artist: andreas mares

September 4th, 2012

Andreas Mares, zugvogel, 2008. Still image

Andreas Mares

Andreas Mares is a passionate artist: a trait that shows not only in the motivation that drives his art, but also in the way he goes about his work and, more than anything , in his work itself. His works, drawings, objects and videos, are far from pompous; on the contrary their reduced and clear aesthetic gives an elegant quality to them. Beneath their luring surface lies a passionate and wild intensity that moves and stirs us. In his work he deals with primary topics of birth, death, fear and the artist’s fragile self. In his work the spectators find themselves reflected. Andreas Mares’ videos, also considered filmed performances, have a meditative character.
The videos’ repose only serves to intensify the poignancy of his work; a work which allows him to question about the real existence, creating emotions that get under one’s skin.

Andreas Mares, re.birth, 2012. Still image

Mares’ childhood took place in a loving and caring environment, however, like in most cases, it was also full of restrictions which injured the child’s soul permanently and have set a pattern of reactions that has influenced his life so thoroughly that at one point Mares wanted to unearth the root of reactions to the outer world which did not ring true to his personality. His interest in therapy was aroused and he has studied his share of Freud’s, C.G. Jung’s and Dürckheim’s papers. Through his research, his interest in the Id and the Ego was steadily growing and he kept at therapeutic initiatives which helped him discover much of the origins of what had altered his innermost identity, his self. At some point he decided that he needed to express his -partial- liberation through artistic activity. At the same time he discovered that through art he could unearth and eliminate more of the hidden obstacles to his self-revelation and simultaneously unleash his self through this new kind of an advanced form of therapy than through any other form of therapy.

Andreas Mares, kopf3, 2006. Object. Flesh

His series köpfe consists, at present, of five heads. These heads are made of animal meat  and preserved in cylindrical glass jars. The missing skin provides a deeper insight and at the same time the absence of this protective layer is revolting. The heads mirror what we refrain from acknowledging, they are like a glance behind the scenes into the shadows of our self.

Andreas Mares’ psychotrauma performance, which took place in 2008 and was documented in a video, is the culmination of Mares’ long standing experience with therapies, intended to free his true inner self. In the video we are reminded of self-cleansing rituals of so-called primitive cultures that sometimes set off a process which puts them into intimate contact with the true nature of their being. What you see in the video is a naked man who sacrifices his socially fabricated “inner child” as he has come to name it and thus can redeem his true, innate “inner child”.

Andreas Mares, zugvogel, 2008. Video

In Mares’ video zugvogel (2008) a bird crashes against the artist’s window pane and this event is the mirror of his own inner journey, full of inner questions as “where do I stand? Wherever I go? How much time remains?”.
The basis for the video re.birth (2012) is a performance in which is reflected the effect of one’s own birth on the personality and behavioral pattern. The birth sets pattern of contact: looking back brought us the opportunity to change these patterns and to increase our empathy and authenticity.
With …journey (2012) Mares starts from the outer, to find out his inner perception.
His last video child (2012) born from the strong need of the artist to accuse and stop the violence against children. As Mares says: “Violence against children in our society is multi-layered, subtle and it is also everywhere. It ranges from an act of non-acknowledgement of a child’s fully fledged personality, or depriving a child of its autonomy and individual personality as well as talents, or directive communication, to physical violence.[…] This is unacceptable and needs to be stopped”.

Andreas Mares, …journey, 2012. Video

Born in Linz (Austria) in 1969, he started drawing in 1980, using coal and, sometimes, blood. From 1990 to 2006 he produced paintings with oil and mixed technique and in 1994 he created his first object made with meat. His first action goes back to 2006 and many others performances has been acted until today, coming along with several videos.

Mares’ video zugvogel is in the “Videoholica” special selection 2012 and it is part of the production of Von Roland Schimmelpfennig‘s “Der goldene Drache“. His artworks was exhibited and screened at “Videoholica“, July 2012 (Bulgaria); “Hidden Cities & Hybrid Identities” festival, July 2012 (Italy); “Hidden Cities” festival, May 2012 (Turkey); “PAN International Videoart Festival“, April 2012 (Italy); “Hidden & Forbidden Identities“, February/March 2012 (Italy) and at “Große Kunstausstellung“, July/August 2011 (Germany). Mares is one of the winners of “Magmart VII Edition” (2012) at CAM (Italy) and his video re.birthhas been admitted in “Magmart’s Hall of Fame” and inserted into the permanent collection of CAM.

more. www.andreas.mares.at