Revealing the structures that define our political and social realities is a focus of Bea Schlingelhoff’s (b. 1971, lives and works in Zurich) artistic practice. In so doing, she refers directly to the specific exhibition venues revealing the power relations at work there. For the exhibition in the Museum des Landes Glarus Freulerpalast Bea Schlingelhoff has developed an artistic intervention – PAX – that addresses both the history of the museum as well as specific museum exhibits. Starting point is the «Military and Weapons in Glarus» section of the collection. This collection of military paraphernalia features a plethora of weapons, uniforms, and other objects collected by the Historical Association of the Canton of Glarus and from 1946 until the 1990s by the Museum des Landes Glarus. The collection has been presented in a permanent exhibition for more than twenty years in a separate building - a former carriage house connected to the museum’s inner courtyard.

Simultaneously esteemed and rarely visited, this part of the museum’s exhibition raises questions concerning political and historiographical representation as well as concerning the relations between art and warfare. The Museum des Landes Glarus Freulerpalast not only houses the historic collections of the canton, the protected landmark and opulent building is itself already museal. The building once served as the private residence of the Glarus guards officer Kaspar Freuler (1595-1651) and was built with funds he could amass from his European wartime dealings. Divided into two parts – Piece of Glass takes place in the weapons collections as well as in the temporary exhibition spaces – the show features two titles: PAX and Piece of Glass not only reference the exhibition’s structural conditions but also imply two possible interpretations. On the one hand, PAX asks what role such a collection plays in the context of the peace movements of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Can a disarmament of the military paraphernalia collection help to facilitate a ‘different’ narration of these objects? To what degree is military paraphernalia part of Glarus’ culture historically or even today?  On the other hand – which structural and economic conditions of the institutions are part of the artistic production process? What role can the artist occupy today in terms of social and political issues? Piece of Glass is not least about questions of artistic production and authorship.

> More information

Off Kunsthaus Glarus: at Museum des Landes Glarus Freulerpalast, Näfels

Opening hours of Museum des Landes Glarus Freulerpalast, Näfels:
Tuesday through Friday  10am-12am / 2pm-5pm, Saturday, Sunday, public holidays 10am-5pm, Monday closed

www.freulerpalast.ch