Cathrine’s Street

2008, approximately 90 x 400 cm and 50 x 100 cm, silk-screen printing on tissue paper, posters

Only a fine line separates shabby and chic in the aesthetics of urban lifestyles. In a lively district, unruly posters, graffiti and other forms of intermediate use of a derelict building bear witness to the vital potential of creativity. In comparison, forms of individual appropriation of public space are also associated with processes of urban decay. The appearance of artists and other so-called pioneers in a given district is often an omen of subsequent processes of gentrification. Districts, buildings and other elements of the constructed environment are subject to relentless processes of change.
Julia Gaisbacher’s piece is a documentation of Katharinenstraße in Dresden over a specific period of time. The translation of the subject to silk paper and to old posters on a street front mirrors the simultaneous fragility and long-term resilience of urban structures. Digital reduction to contours lends the subject universality; the concrete street is a hip example of urban culture.