Review: Opening, Regula Dettwiler, Catching Fire, Kunstraum Weikendorf

Before the art space was dedicated to art, the building served as a fire department armory. Based on this backround, Regula Dettwiler has spent the past few months using her project “Catching Fire”— a term which also refers to the enthusiasm that can take hold of people—to create a participatory network with the aim of doing something together. Therefore, she distributed one hundred tubers of various dahlia varieties—all of which have “fire” in their names—to interested local residents. Over the summer, the plants—which were carefully tended but, due to difficult weather conditions, did not always bloom or sometimes bloomed only briefly—were photographically documented. Through the resulting group portrait of this classic cottage garden flower, the artist explores the power of collective action, the discrepancy between ideal and reality, and, above all, the diverse opportunities offered by participatory processes.