Marianne Maderna :
Aus dem Wäldchen

In Aus dem Wäldchen ('From the Little Wood'), Marianne Maderna has transferred a bronze stele to Gutenbrunn Park in Baden. Executed after a group of gypsum bozzetti conceived nine years ago and entitled Aus dem Wäldchen, a real location for one of these elements has now been found. At the heart of the group of trees, which consists of an old chestnut, a maple and the locally named 'Gottesbaum', there now rises a pointer – incidentally, 'If-pointer' was the name that Marianne Maderna gave to this upright stele – from this bronze sculpture covered with green patina. Only half as high as the surrounding trees, Aus dem Wäldchen does not imitate Nature, but rather asserts itself in the midst of it, precisely through all its artificiality. Its slight turning seems to just about take up the curve of the trunk of the adjacent chestnut tree – yet without referring to it: the slimline sculpture rests within itself too much for that. Not that it cries out for connections – rather, it summons up memories and associations very quietly and without moving. It is based more on a mimesis of Nature, if one may speak about that at all, of proud archaic models of antiquity or the Baroque. And as far as viewing it is concerned: right up to the last moment, Aus dem Wäldchen sought to elude the walker's gaze between the three neighbouring bushy trees. Then it became individualised and was suddenly there. And when those who had found it went away again, the greenish bronze stele also quietly disappeared, to the sketch-like place from whence it had originally come.
(Johanna Hofleitner)