David Fesl, You You
exhibition view
Lombardi—Kargl, Vienna, 2024

David Fesl

David Fesl's sculptural objects bear traces of his everyday life, turning the things he uses regularly into abstract biographical fragments. His precise assemblages, of the most diverse things of nature and everyday life are small in size, but in their balanced composition and play with our perceptions of scale and relation, certainly provide a more monumental evocation in their specific universal forms.

Like a jeweler, Fesl combines the organic and the inorganic, object and artifice, in a way that allows radically opposing elements to come together in a surreal yet harmonious way, until a new morphology emerges. A mucus shell and a scrunchie, a peach stone and recognizablean earring, an onion skin and a screw. In these sophisticated configurations, each individual part undergoes a metamorphosis in which one component emerges concisely: its shape, its colour, its texture. Few everyday objects retain their emblematic charge and recognisable functionality. In the fragile, almost ephemeral works, the associations triggered by the constituent objects and their narrative potential, precisely woven together, trace a constellation of experience and sensory arousal.

The gentle eroticism that characterises these works, suggests a space beyond fixed attribution: connotations remain variable, evading description, and things appear both masculine and feminine. David Fesl frees what he seeks and finds from their preconceived limitations, transforming them into enigmatic forms amongst one another. In an almost painterly way, he infuses the work with his own hand. His sculptural compositions expose and transform the meanings of what constitutes them. Things, in a sense, become queer. In their amalgamation, which is also inherent in great craftsmanship, something fascinatingly new emerges, which in its poetic as well as subtly identity-political visual language situates itself outside conventional categorisation. The decidedly white surrounding space that provides the framework adds an institutional-critical component to this language that underscores Fesl's extraordinary positioning in the field of sculpture and incisive social analysis.

Vanessa Joan Müller

Biography

Born 1995 in the Czech Republic, lives and works in Prague

Selected Solo Exhibitions

2024
I will watch with you, with Esther Kläs, Center for Contemporary Arts, Prague

2023
Hello Yuko, Tomio Koyama Gallery, Tokyo
The Clumsy Imitator of Artificial Life, Fait Gallery, Brno

2022
David Fesl, ADZ, Lisbon
David Fesl, Sperling, Munich

2021
David Fesl, Also on View, T293, Rome
David Fesl, Lulu, Mexico City

2020
The Concrete Boy, Georg Kargl BOX, Vienna
The Weakest Nest Robber, Karlin Studios, Prague

2018
Close Relations, City Surfer Office, Prague

Selected Group Exhibitions

2025
Unfolding Currents: The Pulse of Time, Autostrada Biennale, Kosovo

2024
You You, curated by Kate Sutton, Lombardi—Kargl, Vienna

2022
I Had a Dog and a Cat, curated by Hana Ostan Ožbolt, Georg Kargl Fine Arts, Vienna
Do Animals Go to Heaven?, organized by Collezione Agovino, Chiesa del Purgatorio, Matera

2021
Ester Krumbachová, curated by Edith Jeřábková and Kateřina Svatoňová, House of Arts Brno, Brno
Remembering What Never Existed, curated by Suzanne Friedli and Andreas Furrer, annex14, Zurich

2019
The Trial, The Fall, The Pin Code and Sorry, with Sláva Sobotovičová, ProLuka Gallery, Prague
Soft Objects – Real Feelings, curated by Václav Janočšík and Martina Johnová, The Ústí nad Labem House of Arts, Ústí nad Labem
And what do we have left now?, curated by Kurátoři 2018, Emil Filla Gallery, Ústí nad Labem

2018
Oh, it is easy to be clever if one does..., curated by Pavel Büchler and Mariana Serranová, Castlefield Gallery, Manchester
Oh, it is easy to be clever if one does..., curated by Pavel Büchler and Mariana Serranová, DOX, Prague
Making Oddkin – for joy, for trouble, for volcano love, curated by Nadja Argyropoulou, Nisyros
The Freelance DJ, with Sláva Sobotovičová, Kabinet T, Zlín
Everything Means Nothing, with Jiří Kovanda, UM Gallery, Prague
Studio of Photography, with Isabela Grosseová, Gallery of Academy of Fine Arts in Prague, Prague

2017
Famous Writress, curated by Writing Club, Gallery of Academy of Fine Arts in Prague, Prague

2016
Against Nature: Young Czech Art Scene, curated by Edith Jeřábková and Chris Sharp, National Gallery Prague, Prague

Artistic Conception

2024
20 years of Kontakt, Secession, Vienna

Selected Exhibition Display

2023
Touching Time that Stands Still, curated by Pavlína Morganová, hunt kastner, Prague

2022
I Had a Dog and a Cat, curated by Hana Ostan Ožbolt, Georg Kargl Fine Arts, Vienna
First Book of Emblems: Lenka Vítková, Fait Gallery, Brno

2019
Work on the Future, curated by Václav Janoščík, Fait Gallery, Brno