Thomas Stimm
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Installation at the NÖ Landesmuseum
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The two-stage competition provided the background to the artistic intervention in St. Pölten, for which seven artworks by Austrian artists were recommended for realisation. These projects are by Josef Danner, Bruno Gironcoli, Richard Hoeck, Hans Kupelwieser, Christoph Steffner, Thomas Stimm and Heimo Zobernig. Five commissions for interiors were awarded directly, to Gunter Damisch, Franz Graf, Brigitte Kowanz, Eva Schlegel and Walter Vopava. The winning project in a separate competition for the design of the chapel (1995) is by Arnulf Rainer. Additional existing artworks by Franz Xaver Ölzant, Oskar Putz and Ruth Schnell are also to be found in the Regierungsviertel. Works by Dara Birnbaum and Michelangelo Pistoletto, also selected by the first jury, are not realized.
Since the eighties flowers figure in Thomas Stimm's work - both in the smaller clay pieces and in the large bronze works. Like all of the artist's works the clay pieces with flowers are small models of everyday life, silent stories where the flower plays the classical role of remembrance, classical beauty, growth and waiting. On one of his "Flowers" the artist has said the following: "To me the flower sort of visualizes development which also has great importance for us people. We often spend a whole lifetime learning how to 'open up' in this way. This uninhibited opening of such a delicate construction such as the flower and the subsequent blossoming is enormous..." (Thomas Stimm) In the bronze pieces, the small narration yields to greater dimension and much less flexible material. These flowers which were selected from the competition together with six other projects, are standing in the sculture-garden of the museum like large alien shapes .
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