Exhibition Review with art critic Vanessa Joan Müller and curator Paul Feigelfeld about the exhibition: ‘Tobias Klein/Hong Zeiss: MACHINOISERIE’

Fundamentally ‘principle’ (li 理) and material force (qi 氣) cannot be spoken of as prior or posterior. But if we must trace their origin, we are obliged to say that principle is prior. However, principle is not a separate entity. It exists right in material force. Without material force, principle would have nothing to adhere to.

– Zhu Xi, Collected Conversations 1:11 [tr. Chan]

此本無先後之可言。然必欲推其所從來，則須說先有是理。然理又非別為一物，即存乎是 氣之中;無是氣，則是理亦無掛搭處。

‘Principle’ (li 理) is endowed in me by Heaven (Tian 天), not drilled into me from outside.

– Lu Jiuyuan, Complete Works 1:6 [tr. Chan]

此理本天所以与我，非由外铄。

Tobias Klein (Hong Kong) and Hong Zeiss (Vienna) complement and contradict each other like microcosm and macrocosm.

In their first joint exhibition, Klein’s reinterpretations of ancient Chinese scholar stones (供石 Gongshi), which form a framework of rock and 3D-printed structures, encounter the veins and grains of Zeiss’s paintings, whose scale and distance—whether near or far—always remain unclear. Although they were not created in exchange, the works examine each other on a structural level and open up dimensions of non-human perception to each other.

The mutual observation of objects and images allows us a rare insight into the exile of the inorganic, into tidal currents and mineral structures, which is actually impossible, if not forbidden, for us. We become secret witnesses to communication processes that elude our understanding of what communication is; that can only be measured in geological eras or beyond time; and whose actual qualities lie beyond meaning and the senses as we know them.