Tulips are Fun, People are Boring
Solo Show
07.–19.05.2023, Aussenstelle Kunst Wien

Tapestries tell stories. Charged with cultural references and symbolism, steeped in myths and spectacles, tapestries are idealized depictions of reality, microcosms of meaning and imagery. These tapestries tell stories about tulips. And the multitudes of unspoken histories that lie behind their simple beauty.

For all its playfulness and wonder, the tulip – like all flowers – is a reminder of the impermanence and transience of all things. Its recurring rhythm of blossoming, withering, dying, and blossoming over and over again contradicts the notion of eternal linear progress. Rather, the fascination for the tulip lies in the very interplay of being and becoming. The tulip’s voice whispers: “I declare my rightful place among this parade of wrong choices“, a hymn to existing and resisting within a hypercommodified world.

Flora and Fauna have always shaped our cultural imagination and sense of collective memory. This exhibition relates to a long tradition of flower symbolism on tapestries that seeks to bring nature into the home, while at the same time reinterpreting that tradition by allowing contemporary questions, assumptions and desires to engage in a visual dialogue with past symbolisms of the tulip.

A tulip is a tulip is a tulip. Tulips are fun. People are boring. This exhibition is an ode to this undeniable truth. So, here’s to the tulip, the archetype of all flowers! May we always appreciate its elegance, its resilience, and its unbridled spirit, may we witness its dazzling, colorful liveliness, and may we dream of a world where its beauty reigns supreme.

Photos: Lea Sonderegger
Text: Katharina Stahlhofen