Artist in ResidenceThe Feverish Library

23 August 2023

Photo: Axel Malik

This September, the Hamburg State and University Library (SUB) appears in a new look. In cooperation with CSMC, Axel Malik will turn the SUB into a 'Feverish Library', with art installations on and inside the building. The exhibition opens on 12 September and will be on display until 31 October.

Since 1989, Axel Malik has been writing unreadable signs every day, first in diaries, then also on canvases. 140 volumes with more than 30,000 pages, large-format art works, overwritten books, and installations in various places constitute a project that Malik himself calls ‘the scriptal method’. What he obsessively writes day after day is not readable, at least not in the conventional sense. His characters have no point of reference, are no symbols, are not based on any code, and do not signify or hint at anything. Strangely and strikingly, none of the characters exists twice, each is an unmistakable and unique composition. Taken together, they form an unreadable text that is semantically empty and yet has a differentiated structure.

As ‘Artist in Residence’ at CSMC, Malik is moving on the border between art and science. With his scriptal method, he raises questions: What is writing and what does it encompass? How do we recognise writing and its characters? What is the horizon of signs, their potential and their limit, and how do we possibly get beyond the limit?

A special focus in Malik’s artistic work is on installations and interventions in libraries – places, in other words, that are based on legible, distinct sets of characters with which the unreadable signs are brought into friction. ‘The Feverish Library’ at the Hamburg State and University Library includes elements on the exterior façade, in the foyer, in the information centre and in the group work area.

At the opening event on 12 September, 6:00 pm, there will be a guided tour of the exhibition, starting at the main entrance, followed by reception. Konrad Zepf (SUB) and Shervin Farridnejad (CSMC) deliver introductory remarks. To attend, please send an email to pr"AT"sub.uni-hamburg.de.

The exhibition will be open from Monday to Friday, 9:00 am – 12:00 am, and Saturday to Sunday, 10:00 am – 12:00 am, until 31 October.