Possehl Prize for Lübeck Art 2020
MEMENTO MORBI. A DANCE MACABRE (THE DEATH AND THE TRUTH)
Sebastian Schröder
In June 2020 our jury awarded the second Possehl Art Prize for Lübeck Art to Sebastian Schröder (*1981). One of the reasons given by the panel for its decision was the ‘multifarious’ nature of Sebastian Schröder’s work. His project, A DANCE MACABRE (THE DEATH AND THE TRUTH) consisted of a large diptych made of around 400,000 fused plastic beads, which he presented in April 2023 as part of his MEMENTO MORBI exhibition at the Castle Gate in Lübeck. In this work the media artist and experimental photographer explored historical dances of death in medieval penitential images and related them to the coronavirus pandemic.
He started his mural in 2020, the first year of the coronavirus pandemic, and completed it in 2022. The two pictures in the form of Gothic lancet windows consist of 544 individual tiles, which are composed of HAMA beads, so-called "iron-on beads", using a kind of mosaic technique. With a height of 3.50 metres and a width of 1.60 metres, the dimensions of the diptych's images are modelled on historical windows in the former St. Anne's Convent in Lübeck. The pictorial language of the work is based on memento mori and depictions of saints from the late Middle Ages and early modern period. In its technical execution, A DANCE MACABRE (THE DEAD AND THE TRUTH) was a collaborative work: twelve people, including families, were invited to participate in the realisation of the work, which was a rewarding activity during periods of lockdown and quarantine. All of them were given boxes with iron-on beads and received smaller parts of the overall design as templates.
The MEMENTO MORBI exhibition was staged by Sebastian Schröder as a kind of morbid treasure trove and blended in with the historic walls of the Gastle Gate. In addition to the prize-winning project, the artist presented other works, some of them very personal, that deal with the theme of death and transience.
