Sorcha Dallas

It’s all about the moment. Michael Stumpf’s work suggests a dreamlike atmosphere where the conventional time and space are suspended but constantly evoked. In Stumpf there is the intent to create a new language, or even better a post-language, full of references from a ghostly past, present, future. Stones, metallic dolmens, arranged amulets, or pieces of modern fabric are left as traces of not identified rituals, maybe a personal solitary ritual. Everything hangs in the balance or drops from an instable point, at the same time nothing is totally stopped but continues its movement in a cinematic style. The spectator is constantly looking for a plot, cruising in a ‘New Riviera’ at the boarder of a dark and deep forest. Stumpf seems to recreate a newer-ending sunset where the lost and desolate human being is remembering confused memories. We assist to an assemblage not only of sculptural forms but also of different styles and languages: pop, noir, drama, modernism, horror, romanticism, comedy, grotesque, revival … none of these aspects achieves a moment of climax, but through them we observe the dark side of our banality. Anyway, in a collapse of senses and narratives, the sculptural element of his work emerges as affirmation of a melancholic but not totally disillusioned act. It is the creation of new linguistic code that rises from our dreams, memories and illusions reaffirming the power of ephemeral moments. ‘There is no quiet and no silence’ in the place ‘were they could sit together in the darkness’, it is just ‘a silent massive sculpture’ … The titles of Stumpf’s work could be arranged infinitely crating several different stories. In fact he has sprayed many titles on pieces of paper, as a utopian attempt to freeze and to start his own visions.