We are very pleased to present the second solo exhibition of Sebastian Utzni (*1981 Augsburg, DE) in our gallery. Sebastian Utzni is a flaneur who is at home in both popular culture and visual art. As a conceptual artist he masters many possibilities of artistic work. This time he unfolds his universe in five different groups of works and invites us to follow him.

A large chessboard fixed to the ceiling shows a famous position, each with a black pawn and a black king and their white counterparts, called Mutual Zugzwang. The position is hopeless for the person whose move it is. The white pieces are covered with marble, the black ones with basalt. The board also seems to be made of stone, giving dignity and weight to the chessboard. They are weighty figures that determine the course of the world and yet they are subject to the logic of the game.

Next to the chessboard hang 20 cardboard sheets in A4 format that reproduce forms used in connection with migration issues. The writing on the forms has been removed. The neatly cut out elements indicate, on the one hand, the places that have to be filled in by the applicants, and on the other hand, they reproduce the outlines of the logos of the official bodies from which the forms originate. The shape of the coat of arms points to a form of the Swiss Confederation, the house roof refers to the homeowners' association, HSLU to the place where Sebastian Utzni works, the Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts. Other logos are recognizable, but not always decipherable. The altered forms are reminiscent of the minimalist conceptual art of Lawrence Weiner, Hanne Darboven or Sol Lewitt.

By appropriating and adapting set pieces from pop culture, Sebastian Utzni presents our self-created visual worlds to us as both mirrors and oracles. Utzni sees Back to the Future as a work about works in their juxtaposition with reality. He is interested in the points of contact between pop and real events. Everything is charged with fiction and, conversely, visions, thoughts and events are processed in fiction.

In the hallway, one hears the Booster Speech of the right-wing liberal Babbitt from the 1922 novel of the same name by Sinclair Lewis. The real estate dealer and prototype of a small businessman from the fictional town of Zenith delivers his speech, in which he proclaims the fears and ideas of white America at the beginning of the 1920s on the occasion of the real estate conference in Zenith. Sebastian Utzni adapts the speech, which lasts about 20 minutes, and after a few minutes he plays in the first restrained fireworks salvos, which intensify so much as the speech continues that Babbitt's statements can no longer be heard. Thus Utzni counteracts Babbitt's ideas of an ideal citizen as the standard of modern America.

Sebastian Utzni is interested in the general conditions of art production and reception. His pictorial inventions are often preceded by lengthy research. He is an artist of ideas who traces media shifts. Utzni explores the boundaries between art and life, politics and science. His exhibitions can be described as a description and interpretation of his working methods; close observation reveals connections and complex references between the individual groups of works.

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