Bicycle Culture

The notion that today’s art world could only operate in a very limited way without taking into consideration social issues fully applies to Stefan Draschan’s work. The museum visitors he portrays, with their clothes gazing in awe at art works, transform into a Gesamtkunstwerk. Or the colors of the cars of our design-obsessed car-culture matching architecture. These socio-cultural aspects are the catalysts in Draschan’s approach to art. In Europe, the bicycle has always been a vital part of street culture – it is hard to imagine that cities like Copenhagen, Amsterdam or even the small Münster could function without bicycles. However, the bicycle as a cult object was put on the cultural map by the United States during the recent crisis which witnessed an increase in bicycles by over 30 percent, and also featured the triumph of the fixie. What else are Stefan Draschan’s photographs, in a manner of speaking, than the re-import of this cult? “Only the fiery steed, the bold one, crashes on the racetrack. With thoughtful pace strides the ass.” This excerpt from a poem by Schiller ideally fits Stefan Draschan’s photo series “Bicycle Culture”. The “fallen”, high-powered automobile provides Draschan with the stage for putting in play his “thoughtful” and therefore sustainable bicycle. The series “Bicycle Culture” exhibited here also contains an inherent shift in time, like a film still from two different perspectives, which merge perfectly at the moment of their fusion. The intersection of performance, photography, and sculpture, as found object from the urban space forming a film still of an irony-dripping memorial. Stefan Draschan lives and works in Berlin and Vienna.