Katharina Struber
Cultural Tourist

On Saturday, December 11, 1999, the Rethymnon Centre of Contemporary Art - "L. Kanakakis" Municipal Gallery (now the Contemporary Art Museum of Crete) inaugurated the exhibition "Cultural Tourist," a production based on the work of Katharina Struber. The exhibition was part of the European Pépinières Programme, marking Greece’s first participation in this initiative. The program facilitates the exchange of young European artists, offering them accommodation and the opportunity to produce work in the host country.

For the "Cultural Tourist" exhibition, Katharina Struber was hosted and worked in Rethymno. She was selected from seven interested artists by the program's special committee during a meeting held in February 1999 in Paris. This meeting included Theodoros Terzopoulos, Director of the "Attis" Theatre, representing the Ministry of Culture for the European Pépinières Programme, and Mrs. Maria Marangou, Director of the Centre.

The artist was hosted at the art station of the Athens School of Fine Arts in Evligias, where she worked under the supervision of the Rectorate of the Athens School of Fine Arts and the Centre of Contemporary Art of Rethymnon. The program was curated by Nota Karamanea, Curator of the "L. Kanakakis" Municipal Gallery.

The cost of constructing and presenting her work, including posters, invitations, and other materials, was covered by the Rethymnon Centre of Contemporary Art with special funding from the Ministry of Culture.

Katharina Struber's installation, titled Cultural Tourist, was a site-specific work. Although the title might seem unrelated to the content of the piece, it was intrinsically linked to the city of Rethymnon, where the artist worked. A central theme of her work was the concept of three-dimensional absence of form. As Ms. Karamanea noted in her accompanying text, Struber explored the interplay between shadow and the envelope—or body—of the "object." The sketch, as well as the form of the negative, served as mediums to capture the essence of the absent form.

The work was composed of two sections:
The first was an installation where the shadows of enclosures (clothing, underwear) were "tangibly" captured. These absent objects, representing an equally absent subject—a woman—were present in the space, though reimagined in a different material form, using paper and charcoal dust.

The second section featured a series of photographs displayed on the walls. These photographs began with the shadow of the artist's own body, focusing on the gesture of the photographed subject as the central element.

The exhibition was hosted at the art station of the School of Fine Arts on Evligia Hill and remained open until January 11, 2000.

The work was completed in two sections:
An installation in the space where the shadows of the enclosure (clothes, underwear) were "tangibly" captured. The absent objects of an equally absent subject, a woman, were present in the space in a material way, but with a different material substance, that of paper and charcoal dust.

Alongside the installation in the space, a series of photographs were displayed on the walls, for which the starting point was the shadow of the artist's own body. The gesture of the person being photographed was at the centre of interest here.

The exhibition was hosted at the art station of the School of Fine Arts on Evligias Hill. The duration of the exhibition was until 11 January 2000.