Trouvaille

Chair

I have this chair in my studio, but I don’t sit on it very often. I prefer to look at it. I call it the ‘hare chair’. It was designed by the Japanese architects SANAA, whose work includes the New Museum in New York. A friend of mine, the designer Konstantin Grcic, with whom I exchange ideas constantly, once showed me a book about SANAA and I’ve been a fan of their work ever since. Hares are great animals anyway, so cute and cool. But the chair isn’t kitschy, it’s elegant and reduced – perhaps SANAA are making a humorous reference to Arne Jacobsen? Humour is important to me. In any case, it wasn’t easy to get hold of the chair. I ordered it in Japan for 600 Euros. It took quite a while to be delivered and I had to go to the customs office in Munich to pick it up. They charged me an extra 100 Euros.

Doll

The photographer and illustrator Martin Fengel brought this doll back for me from Bangkok. It sounds a bit childish, but I recognized myself in her straight away – in the friendly but rather crazy look on her face. Martin is my ex-husband and a fabulous artist who always brings me bizarre things – recently it was a towel, also from Thailand, with a cat’s head and very thick fringes made of 100 percent Polyacryl. The doll is made of tightly-wound strands of wool. From a design point of view, I like the way it creates such a strong expression with so few turns. I love the way it takes part in everyday life, so anarchic and cheerful. And no, I haven’t given her a name.

Penguin

Last year, when I was showing my REPLIKA installation in Munich’s Hofgarten with the designer and photographer Gerhardt Kellermann, I was invited to the annual Arcade Dinner of the Münchner Kunstverein: a very elegant event with patrons and collectors and so forth. At some point, this inflatable penguin was carried past and everyone was asking: ‘What’s going on now?’ It was the idea of the Kunstverein’s technician, Josef Köttl. I then borrowed the penguin from him for a presentation of bags in Berlin. It measures three metres across, and we inflated it in a narrow staircase where, all squashed together, it welcomed visitors. Unfortunately later in the evening someone got too close with a cigarette and it was injured. I still haven’t had the courage to tell Joseph Köttl that the penguin is punctured, and I’m still trying to find a bike shop that can repair it.

Memorial

When Michael Jackson died, his Munich fans took over a monument in front of Hotel Bayrischer Hof and turned it into a memorial. Apparently, Jackson spent one night there when he was alive. It’s amazing how lovingly the fans have arranged their memorial – around a monument that is actually dedicated to the composer Orlando di Lasso – and how they look after it. There is always a broom and a shovel on hand, and there are always candles burning for Michael. The people at Munich’s planning department seem to somehow tolerate this occupation. The Indian baker who often sells me something on my way to the studio in the morning has lots of Michael Jackson posters hanging in his shop. I’d been meaning to ask him if he knew about the memorial, but never fund the time. Recently, when I finally got round to asking, he said: ‘sure, my wife looks after the memorial. Don’t you know our website?’

Translated by Nicholas Grindell