Simultaneous Localization and Mapping
Andrzej Steinbach

KIN is delighted to present Andrzej Steinbach’s first solo show in Belgium that opened on Thursday, September 12, 2024 from 6 to 9 pm. The artist was be in conversation at the gallery together with Bettina Steinbrügge and Vanessa Joan Müller on on Friday, September 27 2024, at 7pm. 

Simultaneous Localization and Mapping (SLAM) exhibits Andrzej Steinbach’s latest series Extensions (Erweiterungen), aimed at exploring the intricate terrain where technology and representation of the human form intersect. The exhibition title borrows from a core system in robotics, where understanding and mapping the surroundings whilst simultaneously keeping track of its own location is necessary in order to navigate effectively. This concept matches Steinbach’s approach — a continual re-mapping and exploration, compelling us to question how images are constructed, deconstructed, and reimagined today.

Steinbach’s practice often begins with a linguistic or visual provocation, mirroring the techno-administrative language of our late-capitalist society. This strategy continues to unfold after the title, through a series of seventeen photographic works, out of twenty one, both methodical and elusive. The photographs do not merely depict the human form, they interrogate the very processes by which we come to judge, recognize and categorize that form within a technological framework. Looking at it more closely, alternating colour and black and white, the model here, though not a merely passive recipient of power, poses with a variety of tools – including an invisible machine – or loose building parts, all within a staged set excluding them from any specific temporal spatial context.

Underlining philosopher Marshall McLuhan’s notion of technology as extensions of the human body, these images invoke the standardising protocols of industry, governance and biopolitics, examining how innovations and societal norms regulate and discipline bodies. Yet, they remain intentionally opaque, resisting the clarity these systems strive to impose. We could see them as expressions of social processes, as holders of knowledge, as demonstrations of biopolitical power, although never fully capturing a sense of absolute truth. They might raise the issue of who has the authority, or the actual ability to represent opinions or even themselves, of who wields the power to shape certain perspectives. Who trully controls their own image and has the autonomy to direct their own development, moving beyond the bounds of standardisation? In this way, each photograph becomes a site of tension, where the familiar is rendered strange, and the boundaries between the self and the other, the real and the represented, blur.

The exhibition also features one readymade, two altered objects and the video work ohne Titel (dreihundert Nägel) (2019). The video piece with its rapid succession of bent nails, reminiscent of the human form, captures the disintegration of standardisation. What was built to be absolutely normative, both in its form and in its utilitarianism, becomes an abstract image, made singularly unique by its distortions. These different elements, punctuating the space, underscore Steinbach’s reflections on materiality and objecthood. They reinforce the artist’s dialogue with the intricacy of contemporary visual and social systems and transform these banal objects into sites of ambiguity as well as contemplation.

Now, while Steinbach’s work is deeply analytically engaged, it always befriends a sense of idiosyncrasy. Though serious in its inquiries, the research is not without a mischievous core; this openness to levity enables an additional layer of complexity, inviting to navigate the tension between reflection and the whimsy, encouraging us to look beyond how an aesthetic can sometimes be read. Simultaneous Localization and Mapping creates a space where the extensions of our bodies through tools and devices extend the ambiguities of our identities and how we represent ourselves. This compels us to consider not just what we see, but how we see and how our ways of seeing are governed by the very technologies that promise to extend our reach. Engaging with Steinbach’s work means navigating the complexities of contemporary life, where conceptions, our notions of the self, are in constant flux, and the maps we use to chart our course are subject to endless reconfiguration.

Inès-Gabrielle Tourlet Ordoñez

Andrzej Steinbach (b. 1983 in Czarnkow, Poland, lives in Berlin), earned his Meisterschűler in 2017 from the Academy of Visual Arts Leipzig under Prof. Heidi Specker, after completing a Diploma in Fine Arts at the same institution in 2013. His education also includes international experience, such as a period at the National Institute of Design in Ahmedabad, India. Steinbach is active in curatorial and collective practices, having co-directed the project space Briefing Room in Brussels from 2022 and participated in artist collectives like Eurogruppe and Galerie BRD. He has held numerous solo exhibitions, with recent highlights including “Verschont mein Haus, zündet andere an” at Kunsthalle Osnabrück (2022), and has also been featured in significant group exhibitions, such as “Planet Earth: 21st Century” at Folkwang Museum, Essen (2023), or “Being: New Photography 2018” at MoMA, New York. Andrzej Steinbach’s work belongs within several international institutions, including MoMA and Centre Pompidou Paris.