written by Carlotta Drinkewitz

I see, I see, I see myself or am I another?

As if called upon, a moment of gathering reveals itself to us. Cora Wöllenstein and Eva Noeske present us seemingly non-human beings, appearing in spaces, sometimes of natural origin, sometimes ‘man-made’, in which they are exploring their surroundings. In doing so, they attempt to break through their physicality and step out of their spaces. They traverse the final layer, the surface, which could represent their own skin or the final layer of painting, in order to engage in dialogue with you.

Are they strangers or companions, attempting to read them is doomed to fail. For in the moment of observation, you will realize that you cannot engage in dialogue with them. What do they want to tell you, what do you represent in their eyes? They remain silent.

Let us consider the Narcissus and Echo myth together as a comparison:

Echo, captivated by Narcissus's beauty, follows him into the forest and speaks to him. She tries to win him over but can only repeat his final words and produce no words of her own. Narcissus himself is not taken with her words, his words, and rejects her love. Echo then retreats into the forest, loses her body, and is now only perceived through the voice of the echo she returns to others. Narcissus, cursed by the rejection of Echo, now sees himself in a reflective stream and falls in love with his own reflection. He realizes he cannot reach his image, subsequently kills himself, and melts away in love. Like Echo, the works only echo the words that you, like Narcissus, can only say to yourself. Like him, you find no counterpart but look into the reflective (water) surface of the works. You gaze into your own eyes and open a dialogue with yourself.

In the reflection, we are alone in the space that lies behind us. But unlike the mirror, which instantly returns, serving only as a conveyor of an image, in the exhibited works, the reflections are stored. They open their own utopian space, to which access is denied to us, but which we can observe from the outside. The beings, on the sidelines, echo our thoughts and send them back to us. From afar, the echo sounds like a canon from the forest, they sing their story, which is ours.