BERLIN.- On the occasion of this year´s Gallery Weekend and after successfully hosting the Autocenter show 'Neue Welt, view on Autocenter' during ART BASEL 2011, the art space SALTS open their own group show 'Stepping Stone' as of April 20th, 2012 here in Berlin.

The exhibition draws on seven artistic positions that examine different methods of display, the intrinsic value of an object and the hierarchies that are assigned to these objects in any given surrounding. The artists’ engagement with the architecture of the exhibition room, is rarely disruptive but more regularly enhancive. By placing works made of domestic or industrial, but characteristically simple materials, the artists’ jolt the viewer’s perception of the known into the unknown or new, starting an investigation in what abstraction can represent today. From the personal, to the political or the social, it suggests that abstraction is offering a more dynamic platform to engage within the public realm (than figuration or representational art).

Appropriation has significantly changed from its initial rise in the 1980s. It has evolved into something more intimate, relating to the self, the home or even in this case to the artist’s subjective view of modernism in general. The artists often make use of found materials or readymades but they are no longer merely concerned about decontextualising the object’s original value by placing it into the framework of an exhibition. Instead, the presentation serves to re-define each artist's practice and more so questions the object’s relationship between the material and its resulting form. Ultimately, it examines how the idea shapes its own identity through the display and its often-equivocal content, thus becoming its own stepping stone.

Frank Altmann (D), Awst & Walther (UK/D), Nina Beier (DK), Eva Berendes (D), Stefan Burger (CH), Martin Soto Climent (MX) and Adam Thompson (UK) use cement, steel, textiles, plastic, metal, wood and paint in their artistic practise. The working process of these artists shares a common regime, which attempts to imbue the works with a sculptural quality that spatially engages on a very basic and intrinsically interlaced level, the object is or was part of the living or the exhibition room.

SALTS is a contemporary salon focusing on the discourse of current works by international artists. the private apartment, located in Birsfelden/Basel (CH) serves as the place for exhibitions, performances, concerts, dinners and events. The space, originally called SAL Projects, was initiated in 2009 by Samuel & Anna Leuenberger. In November 2010, Tobias Spichtig joined the project. SALTS is a non-for-profit venue and is today a collaborative exhibition project, including contributions by Anna Leuenberger, Samuel Leuenberger, Fabian Schöneich, Tobias Spichtig, Alexandra Stähli and Quinn Latimer.