Eberhard Havekost

At first glance, Havekost’s buildings seem like modernist visions of a grand utopian ideal. Ambassadors of progress, they stand tall and proud, beaming with confidence and utilitarian virtue.  They are perfect, almost propagandist, righteous in their monumentality.  But all is not as it seems.  Though his works are based on copious photographs, like an airbrushed model, Havekost subtly alters angles, colours and structures to enhance his subjects.  Thus, we are offered an ingenious commentary on the modes and meanings of image construction in our capitalist, media-driven world. 

In the present work, we look up at a building rising out of the ground like a beacon, bathed in sunlight and brimming with vigour.  Yet, the shadow of trees blanketing the bottom of the composition is slightly blurred, like a still frame from a movie, chained to a moment in the past.  This pang of nostalgia seems at odds with the composition’s sense of modernist triumph.  Consequently, this temporal disunity strikes a note of discord, as if all has been contrived and canned for our consumption.  Suddenly, the angles seem a little bit off; the perspective, a bit asunder. We are left feeling put out by a sleight of hand show. 

Growing up in the Eastern Bloc, Havekost has had a privileged view of the collapse of one ironclad ideology and the emergence of a new. Thus, he exposes our vulnerabilities, asking us to reflect on the perils of blind capitalistic faith. Indeed, as the name Augenränder suggests, too much wide-eyed optimism can make the eyes weary.