STONE, the exhibition at gallery Bernhard Bischoff & Partner, marks the conclusion of a weighty art tour organised by Swiss artist duo Com&Com (Marcus Gossolt / Johannes M. Hedinger): three large stones from the UNESCO World Heritage Tectonic Arena Sardona were sent on a year-long journey through Switzerland visiting several UNESCO World Heritage Sites.

The three stones – Verrucano rock left in its natural state – weighed six to eleven tons and answered to the names of TEK, TO and NIK. TEK from Glarus, TO from St. Gallen and NIK from Grison, they stemmed from the three cantons that share the area of the heritage site, which is most famous for its two landmarks Glarus Thrust and Martinsloch.
The tour started in mid-winter and the stones first travelled from St. Gallen Abbey District to the old town of Berne where they remained for two weeks on Waisenhausplatz right in front of the gallery. The next lap took them to the prehistoric pile dwellings around Lake Zurich and, via World Heritage Rhaetian Railway Line Thusis-Tirano, to the Albula Railway Museum in Bergün. During the last five months of their tour they stayed at the Triennal Festival Bad Ragartz before returning to their original locations in November.

The current exhibition centres around hyper-real 3D prints of the stones scaled down to 1:10 in size and 1:10,000 in weight accompanied by photographs, drawings and risograph prints.
The artificially created stones stand in stark contrast to the large scale naturalistic photographs and spontaneous drawings, creating a highly charged dialogue between the analogue and digital as it has also infiltrated nature.

For the duration of the exhibition, an experimental video of the stones’ tour will be shown in the Videokunst.ch showroom at PROGR and the video window of cinema Houdini in Zurich.

Production: Com&Com, UNESCO World Heritage Tectonic Arena Sardona
Video: Thomas Rickenmann, Extramilefilms
Sound: Fabian Gutscher
Photographs: Maurus Hofer
3D-Printing: prodartis AG
Scans: Terradata
Transportation: Logbau AG

For further information go to: www.tektonik.ch / www.com-com.ch