LOBBY 1

Exploring the hidden dimensions of everyday materials, Thomas Wachholz (1984, Germany) condenses the objects which inspire his works to a restricted number of colour and shapes. 

Through his works, Wachholz explores how mundane objects such as matchbooks and postcards can become fraught with personal memory and material history. For years, the works have appropriated the formal layouts and functions of matchboxes and matchbooks. 

Gathered in places like hotels, restaurants, gas stations, cinemas, clubs, and company lobbies, the colourfully designed boxes are now far less commonplace than they once were. Like postcards, matchboxes are charged with a potent nostalgia—both a nostalgia for the specific time and place one might have collected the object; and a nostalgia for the quickly fading era in which these souvenirs were more widespread. 

Many of Wachholz’s works include a striking surface, produced through the artist’s application of red phosphorus. The phosphorus grid, which disappears between the composition of the paintings and its geometric lines, symbolises the potential for viewers to truly “activate” the paintings through their personal associations and memories.