signs and symbols

July 16 - July 29, 2020

Opening Online: Thursday, July 16, 6:00pm
Closing: Wednesday, July 29, 6:00pm

signs and symbols is pleased to present Endogenous Error Terms, a video exhibition by Mischa Leinkauf as part of the gallery’s series of online-only solo presentations of video works. Endogenous Error Terms emerged from a seven-year research and exploration of underground water canals all over the world, starting in Tokyo in 2011 right after the big Tohoku Earthquake (Fukushima disaster).

For centuries people have been trying to tame rivers and tides by drilling the subsoil beyond the ground on which we live. These architectural remains, hostile to humans and most animals, form a kind of invisible road system directly under the ground of our cities. By definition, a shelter is a basic architectural structure that provides protection from local environment. Having a place of refuge, safety and retreat is generally regarded as a basic physiological human need, which is the basis for the development of higher human motivations. From this origin Mischa Leinkauf began an intensive exploration of lifeless architectural structures that lie underground. While he stayed in these upside-down areas of the city, Leinkauf’s perspective changed from exo- to endogenous. A process that originates from within an organism or a cell. The womb of the city. Endogenous Error Terms captures moments of being inside these left alone architectural spaces in Japan, Mongolia, Russia, Germany, Greece, Austria and Italy. The work consists of a single-channel video work and an accompanying ongoing photo series that brings the audience right into an unseen area of all our busy metropolis.

*Please note that Leinkauf's video will be viewable online from Thursday, July 16 at 6:00pm until Wednesday, July 29 at 6:00pm. Following the end of the exhibition, the video will only be accessible via private link and password. We trust that given our current circumstances, everyone will act in good faith and good will, understanding that these are primary artworks by our artists that are collected and which would otherwise be password protected.

Berlin born and based artist mischa leinkauf deals with the hidden possibilities of urban environments and various kinds of limitations of spaces through borders, rules and architecture. Through interventions in quasi-natural systems of order, he provokes situations that create temporary confusion and open up spaces for a possible recoding. His actions are subversive antics in the unruly and playful Debordian tradition of the dérive, but here the experiential immediacy and spontaneity is counterbalanced by a conceptual framework of precise planning and execution. Leinkauf is part of the artist duo Wermke/Leinkauf and has received numerous awards worldwide and exhibited internationally at venues such as Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo Japan, Helsinki Art Museum, Moderna Museet Stockholm, ZKM Karlsruhe, Kunstmuseum Bonn and Manifesta 11.