The Door, 2022

In this first work of this exhibition, language is also evident in the form of the company logo. These letters stand alone, and also are part of the material, with which they are directly bound as an immobile element. In the work group The Door (2002) the language used has a greater dynamic element. The first object on the upper left is a framed and unprinted sheet of newspaper. Adjacent to this there is a simple industrial press board, which, like the pink isolation boards in the previous work, is a highly synthetic material used for insulation, even if its wooden content makes it seem more natural. The first object on this board is a real title page of an edition of The New York Times pinned to it like a kind of scientific specimen. The selection of this specific edition plays no particular role here, and the recurring structure of how this iconic newspaper presents itself with its name and other text and image elements are more significant. As if extracted from this arrangement, on the board there is series of words that have all been overpainted or deleted except for a single ​“The.” Here an element of conceal ment becomes an aesthetic strategy that is reinforced or doubled by a door leaf stand- ing over parts of the deleted text. This is another industrial mass product with standard dimensions that is also manufactured synthetically, like the board on which it is leaning. Also, the word“leaf” adds a linguistic reference to the newspaper and to paper as such, from which the door leaf itself is partly made. As an object it is here to a degreedeprived of its actual function, as it cannot be opened or closed, and all it does is hide something. The two words ​“The Door” above the board on the right in combination with this object invite us to reflect how an object acquires itsmeaning. Is this due to its purpose or the way it is made, or a combination of the two? Art hereby repeatedly undermines such ascription and parameters, and it is precisely this that Dunst utilizes in his work by piling up objects, materials, and linguistic formulations in layers and overlaps to produce a complex of multiple meanings.

The Door, 2022
Five-part group of works, variable dimensions
Blank sheet framed in frame
Newspaper New York Times
Press board raw, 280 × 135 × 1,9 cm
Door leaf with metal mounts, 85 × 205 × 4 cm
Sign, print on paper laminated on Dipond,
88 × 22 × 1,5 cm
Courtesy Galerie nächst St. Stephan Rosemarie Schwarzwälder, Vienna