Paul Leitner: Antisolubility of Difference

Paul Leitner’s work often takes the form of common arrangements or apparatuses that normally function under simple mechanisms and physical laws, yet when he adapts or modifies the pieces slightly they come to deploy unexpected, symbolic, poetic or critical effects. Tools or instruments, clocks, thermometers, nuts or railway tracks become the markers of historical shifts, economic and socio-political processes – meaning improvements, but also standardisation, control and normalisation. A norm, from the Latin norma, meaning ‘square’ or ‘rule’, designates a widespread condition and is considered a rule to be followed. Leitner works both with and against norms – be they metric, temporal, material, technical or aesthetic norms – with an obvious economy of means. The materials used are often ‘insignificant’: found, swapped or bought at a low price. Forms mainly result from functions. Processes are mainly left to their entropy – or the entropy of an already existing system is fostered.
Text: Anne Faucheret, 2017