Speed of Cars series
From road level with a focus partially directed up, the urban space is discovered in a high-speed journey. The protagonist is a remote-controlled car, little larger than a toy, which Matthias Mayer (aka Mo Magic) has created himself. The car is the hero, diving into the rough life of the big city and thanks to the chosen perspective not only surviving there, but confidently behaving as an ‘anarcho-vehicle’.
The car intervenes in road traffic as a remote-controlled living sculpture and makes the urban space its own. The Speed of Cars series formulates a ‘visual rap’.
HU’ Made, 2010, 3:05 min
Video work created during a work visit at the invitation of the Zendai Museum of Modern Art Shanghai as part of ‘Intrude Art & Life 366’, China (2008)
Hendek Hendek Atladim, 2010, 3:00 min
Video work created as part of the exchange project ‘Komsular Arasi – Amongst Neighbours’ between the districts of Cihangir in Istanbul and Berlin-Mitte in cooperation with Kolonie Wedding e.V. (2009)
SIX TT 01, 2015 (HD, 14 min)
The video shows Mayer performing with a Triple DJ Set (six record players and three mixing consoles), tripling the complexity of the work of the DJ, and it is this hightened complexity which opens up the space for sound experiments and the unknown. The three threads of sound are interwoven and interfere with each other. Often working as a DJ, Mayer here tries to create something like inverted or anti-DJing; a cacophony, in which the different sounds create a conglomerate as dissonant as possible – but still embody music.
Life: Matthias Mayer
Matthias Mayer, born 1967 in Worms, Germany, is an artist, curator and exhibition organiser since the early 1990s. His artistic work includes painting, sculpture, installation, video, performance and photography. A frequent approach in his work is to question social rules and conditions in the context of popular culture. He has recently worked with a focus on the interaction of music and visual arts.
Since 2003, Mayer has been running the project space Spor Klübü in Berlin-Wedding, member of Kolonie Wedding, curating and organising over a hundred exhibitions to date.
Matthias Mayer has worked and exhibited internationally, in New York, St. Petersburg, Istanbul and Shanghai (among others). He has had several project grants from Berlin Senate and others. Currently he is an active member of the Berlin Network of Project Spaces and Initiatives and does cultural policy work for structural improvements.