South African artist Ed Young has been invited by Madame l’ Ambassadeur Esther Eppstein to reside in Zurich and present an exhibition in the shop windows of the art space “Die Diele” as part of the exhibition series “Die message salon Diele”.
To mark the opening of the intervention “It’s Fun Without You” in the two shop windows on Sihlhallenstrasse, message salon embassy Zine No. 18 will be published.
“The #$@&%*!” Ed Young
Edition of 70 Copies ©2019 Ed Young & message salon
“The #$@&%*!” is a pamphlet, a crude text shot out of a Twitter machine gun, a breathless string of disturbing statements. Who is speaking in this text? The texts, designed in the same typography, do not reveal any emotions, appear visually almost harmless, but the statements are brutal, maliciously vulgar and gloomy in their effect. Are they real fragments from comment columns, provocative advertising slogans, tweeted hate messages or political propaganda? Or perhaps the spawn of an unleashed algorithm, fed with daily obscenities from the internet? Ed Young’s text works are disturbing and uncomfortable.
The artist’s attitude to the content of the text is no longer recognisable, and moral absolution is sought in vain. Ed Young leaves this unpleasant task to the readers of the text.
The artist has made a name for himself with socially critical interventions in galleries and art institutions, and in the meantime as co-operator of the experimental project space Youngblackman in his home city of Cape Town. Ed Young is connected to the city of Zurich and its art scene through several artist residencies, and in 2013 he worked on the Veli & Amos billboard on the terrace of Perla-Mode.
message salon would like to thank: Livio Baumgartner (Die Diele), City of Zurich Culture, 25hours Hotel Langstrasse, Pro Helvetia Johannesburg.
Special thanks go to Basil Kobalt for his technical support.