Lina Hermsdorf
Goethe/Gasworks Residency 2016

During her residency, Lina Hermsdorf worked with Gasworks’ archive of previous exhibitions and residencies to explore the human use and interaction with Gasworks by current and previous users, examining it as a living system that required maintenance.

Drawing from her former projects, she used the raw data from the Gasworks’ building – such as the efficiency of the heating system, gas and electricity consumption, as well as the hours of labour and finances required for the upkeep and smooth running of the organization – in order to develop an environment for a work that shifts between a performative composition and installation. Central to this notion of maintenance within an organisation and studio space for Lina was the coffee machine which she saw as both an enabler of activity and something that brought users together and, after she dismantled it was revealed as a complex system in itself. Lina also produced a collage of images of Gasworks’ staff and artists’ mothers, echoing and inverting the inaugural exhibition at Gasworks focussing on the fathers of the building’s then occupant.
 
During her residency at Gasworks Lina participated in a range of scheduled events, talks and meetings. This provided the opportunity for the artist to introduce herself and her practice to local art professionals, as well as giving London audiences a chance to get to know her work. In December, Lina participated in the Winter Open Studios event, in which she and the other artists-in-residence opened their studios to the public.
 
Often mediated through lecture performances or installations, Lina Hermsdorf’s essayistic works address questions around epistemology and its relation to the cybernetic paradigm. Having worked in the field of theatre and gradually transitioning into the visual arts, her practice is informed by cross-disciplinary techniques and an interest in narrative strategies. Her protagonists range from humans to fresh water animals and technological devices, telling tales of ageing, diet, origin, exercise, generational shifts, bilateral symmetry, immortality, green tea and entropy. The entities are constantly changing and (un-)learning, adapting to each new environment and responding to their architectural surroundings.
 
Lina Hermsdorf studied Theatre at the University in Giessen and Fine Arts at the Städelschule in Frankfurt. Her works have been shown at Artworks London (2017), Salon Kennedy, Frankfurt (2016), Good Forever, Düsseldorf (2016), Atlas Economy at Mélange, Cologne and Human Resources, Los Angeles (2016), Museum Abteiberg Mönchengladbach (2016), BlockUniverse, London (2016), Minibar, Stockholm (2015), Yvonne Lambert, Berlin (2015), Kunsthalle Baden-Baden (2015), Rowing, London (2015), and Taylor Macklin during the Contemporary Art Weekend in Zurich (2015), among other venues. She also founded the collective Atlas Economy, which functions as a brand that can be used or appropriated for realising projects in any field: art, sociology, science, architecture, politics.
 
See more about her work on Gasworks’ website and on Lina’s Vimeo site.
 
The residency took place from October to December 2016.
 
A collaboration between Gasworks and the Goethe-Institut London.

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