Florian Graf - Out & About

Poetic engagement with art and nature

The Mapprach Estate near Basel is regarded as an ideal, holistic mesh of culture, nature and landscape. In his exhibition “Out & About” the internationally renowned artist Florian Graf enables the concept of the hermitage come to life again on the estate by translating it into a contemporary context and precisely integrating his works of art into this idyllically fashioned landscape. The publication Florian Graf- Out & About, richly illustrated with photographs of Graf’s sculptures and interventions, guides us through the park landscape and promotes a fruitful dialogue between art, nature and agriculture.

Florian Graf has placed evocative signs of his presence in the park of the estate. His artistic interventions take visitors by the hand and accompany them through the landscape, drawing their attention to apparently inconspicuous things, such as a passing butterfly which the artist recalls by means of a plaque. The project will not be over for the artist when the exhibition opens and the sculptures and works are complete. Graf will continue to live in the role of the hermit in a small wooden pavilion slightly above the Baroque estate where he can engage in dialogue with visitors and with nature.

Florian Graf’s poetic engagement with art and nature stimulates us to think about our treatment of natural resources and nature and to consider man’s existence on Earth. Texts by Markus Krajewski, professor at Basel University, and Ines Goldbach, director of the Kunsthaus Baselland, and a conversation between the artist and the curator Daniele Settelen-Trees present the theme of the dialogue between nature and culture and outline the artist’s unusual exhibition project and his role as ‘ornamental hermit’.

About the artist:

Florian Graf (*1980) operates in his art on the borderline between art and architecture, linking sculpture, installation, drawing, photography and short films. He is interested in the psychological and emotional impact that spaces have on their users. His artist works make reference to specific architectural or social situations and create places of poetic density.