Otis Laubert

Conceptual artists Otis Laubert was born on January 8, 1946 in Valaská, north-western Slovakia. Although he “only” attended the secondary school of applied arts in Bratislava between 1961 and 1965, he has been for at least three decades one of the most significant Slovak visual artists. Among his best-known works are his visually distinct installations in which he makes use of old and useless objects he collects. “Imagine that you find yourself in the middle of some magical space where you are surrounded by common everyday things that are nevertheless incredibly and unconventionally organized according to various obvious as well as less comprehensible criteria”, Slovak curator, critic and gallerist Juraj Čarný wrote about Laubert’s installations. They are fascinating not just because of their inventiveness but particularly due to their systematic and rhythmical arrangement which always has high poetical-visual qualities. In Laubert’s rendition, collecting comes close to a syntactic intention enabling the author to develop his philosophical questioning as well as to capture the uninformed viewer. Laubert’s work has a wider scope and exceeds the notion of collecting; however, his interest in ready-made and re-codification of contexts remains his artistic domain. An important feature of his work is subtle irony and the wit of his installations and objects which become, among other things, a certain commentary on the working process and art as such. Many exhibition of Laubert’s work have been held, particularly since the 1990s, not only in Slovakia where his considered one of the classics of contemporary art.

Martin Dostál

Mikulov Art Symposium 2011

July 16th - Agust 13th, 2011

• Theoretician of the Year
• Photostory
• Catalogue (pdf)