Renowned for disrupting and reconfiguring space in unexpected ways, Hans Schabus has previously produced site-specific installations that rely upon the physical and psychological effects of spatial displacement to demythologise cultural symbols. For Remains of the Day, Schabus transformed Collective’s interior with a formal presentation of the rubbish accumulated by the artist and his family during one calendar year - installed, cleaned, categorised and displayed linearly along the length of the white cube gallery spaces and reception area.

This work brought attention to the concept of scarcity as a fundamental economic problem. Scarcity implies that not all of society's goals can be pursued at the same time; trade-offs are made. Certain goods are inherently scarce by definition or by design; examples include land and positional goods such as awards and membership of elites.

In a world where things derive all or most of their value from their scarcity and cultural capital, Hans asks us to consider our relationship with what remains, from trade, labour and our human existence.

Events

Western, BBC Big Screen, Festival Square.
Collective showed Schabus's film Western, 2002. This was screened at selected times on the BBC Big Screen in Festival Square. The 11 minute film shows Schabus rowing and sailing his way through the tunnels of Vienna’s underground sewage system in a boat he built himself. His unending voyage through sewage, darkness and waster dredges up the universal quests of escape both literal and metaphysical.

Hans Schabus lives and works in Vienna. He was selected to represent Austria in the 2005 Venice Biennale with his mountainous installation Das letzte Land (The Last Land) that engulfed Josef Hoffmann’s modernist-inspired Austrian Pavilion. Solo exhibitions include Wohin und zurück, Galerie Jocelyn Wolff, Paris, 2010; Die Rocky Horror Hansi Show, Clubblumen, Vienna, 2010; and Europahaven, Rotterdam, 2009.

Read the Remains of the Day publication here

Read about Remains of the Day in Line magazine, The Independent, The Sunday Times, The Student and Art Monthly.

Supported by the Austrian Cultural Forum and the Elephant Trust.

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