Gertrud & Tiederich

Special opportunities produce films. In the case of Gertrud & Tiederich, it all started with a solicitation made by the art patrons and collectors Gertraud & Dieter Bogner: Might Josef Dabernig be interested in creating a site-specific work for their Buchberg castle art space near Gars am Kamp in Lower Austria? Upon visiting, an ideal motif was instantly found, one that presented a truly "Dabernigian" space – the sacristy of the fortress chapel containing a megalith bearing the names from which the film borrows its title. The chamber is still used today to house objects used for church services, but by and large, the space feels a touch lost and dismal. Somewhat fleeting, spatially exploratory perspectives captured by a handheld camera alternate with an austerely contemplative recording of the place and its objects. Subjects often appear in fragments and are hauntingly framed, as when a veiled gonfalon seems to assume the form of a ghost. Dabernig himself appears on screen three times, reading the titles of artworks located in other rooms of the castle off a piece of paper. He does not include the names of their creators, and the list sounds like a litany or team line-up, underscored by a somewhat monotonous organ music. The entire art collection gathers in spirit in this astonishingly ordinary space, assuming the form of a mischievous audiovisual Vanitas. (Olaf Möller)

Translation: Eve Heller


Iron door, bell rope, arches, traces of wall exploration, altarpiece and the sparse furniture of a castle´s sacristy. In between the filmmaker, quasi praying the rosary of the castles own art collection. He reads the titles and technical data for the artworks, accompanied by austere organ sounds. Space and scenery counteract the conventions of art business and shift the signifiers of such an anti-museum towards strange meaning. (production note)