MATHIS ALTMANN

Stud Finder is a satiric investigation into historical and contemporary socio-political events through sculpture and wordplay.

A disassembled Victorian dollhouse sits atop a discarded drawer flocked in red, like a city upon a hill, calling into question a perverse phenomena in miniature: Western notions of property, and how disparate meanings of ‘stud’ build identities. Here are the differences between private, domestic and public domains placed on display, and positioned as the intersection of social human interaction.

‘Stud’ is a word of many origins and a carrier of various meanings. Studs set a uniform 16 inches apart form a vertical support panel of a building to which sheathing, plywood, drywall, are attached. A ‘stud’ is also a young sexually active man with a seductive reputation: a guy, a playboy, a gigolo, a womanizer. It is too a virile pedigreed male horse or dog kept for commercially profitable breeding.

Mathis Altmann completed his BFA at the Zurich University of the Arts, 2011. Recent solo exhibitions include: Art Basel: Statements, Basel (2018); Istituto Svizzero, Milan (2018); Freedman Fitzpatrick, Los Angeles (2017); Swiss Institute, New York (2016); Truth & Consequences, Geneva (2016); Halle für Kunst, Lüneburg (2015). Recent group shows include: MD72/Galerie Neu, Berlin (2017); MAAT, Lisbon (2017); Palais de Tokyo, Paris (2016).