Woodstock

In her exhibition “Woodstock”, Zurich artist Zuni Halpern is showing a series of etchings as well as a video work that she began in 2001 and continues to this day.
In these small filmic productions, the artist addresses seemingly banal everyday questions to a counterpart and responds to them in the role of the other, second self. The artist, a child of her time, is insecure and is pressurised by role models, shaped by images in the media and advertising. The daily inner struggle for individuality in a world that strives for uniformity is decided in the simplest questions and decisions.
In the video “Painting”, the artist appears as a figure who gets caught up in contradictions over the question of painting, the choice of technique and the discussion of the “good picture”.
Determining the right medium is a recurring theme in Zuni Halpern’s work. Using painting, video, sculpture or textiles, the artist searches for the appropriate interplay of form and content. The new etchings were created at the same time as the video sequence “Painting”, which addresses the artist’s crisis with her demands on painting.
Zuni Halpern’s graphic sheets show pure, monochrome surfaces, drawings, texts or the play of shadows in colourless embossing. The etchings were created in collaboration with the printer and artist Peter Stiefel. “Woodstock”, the title of the series, is an ironic reference to American art of the 1960s and a romanticised longing for the hippie era, free love and a liberated society – the failed ideals of the parents’ generation.