"Chopped" as creative food for mind and spirit
Aachen. Would you like a bit more? In the Salvini butcher's shop, Bismarckstraße 100, the obligatory inquiry of these days sometimes shows a completely different path than that of anything meaty. Not fish, not meat, not physical, but rather cultural delights are promised by the latest work by five artists from different fields, which König Kunde can now purchase as a creative meatball between filets and beef - exclusively, of course.
Food for the head and soul: the inclined interpreter can let the question of the causes of the unusual concerted action between butcher and muses melt in his mouth, according to taste. One thing is certain: "3/4 pound of pork mince" is the title of the latest video production which the Aachen cameraman and photographer Gerd Plitzner is offering for sale together with the recently deceased dancer Marcio Valeriano, the percussionist Wanderson Valeriano de Azevedo as well as the organist Lutz Felbick and the painter Ralf Walraff - "hygienically cleanly packed and shrink-wrapped in foil".
An original artist's video, the makers apostrophize the 27-minute-long strip. A collage of the most diverse creative headbirths, with Ralf Walraff's work at its centre. On display are paintings and photographs by the trained graphic designer, which - to stay in the picture - represent the foil for the experimental sound surfaces of pianist Lutz Felbick. The whole thing is spiced up with a pinch of textual sprinklings such as commentaries from jazz concerts. This art world contrasts with laconically contemplative landscape shots, primarily from the Hautes Fagnes, as well as excerpts from a performance by the dancer Valeriano, who many Aacheners will probably have remembered not least because of his performances in the Ludwig Forum.
All this is put together in completely unhectic cuts to form an essayistic homage to one and a half decades of Ralf Walraff's artistic work - while stocks last. So if the spirit is willing, the flesh should not remain weak for too long.
Matthias Hinrichs / Aachen Zeitung 1997
