Artist’s Talk with Peter Fend

• In conjunction with the exhibition Potential Worlds 2: Eco-Fictions
• Online Talk: Peter Fend in conversation with Suad Garayeva-Maleki, former artistic director, YARAT Contemporary Art Space, Baku, and co-curator of the exhibition
• Please register to receive the Zoom link.
• In English
• A cooperation of the Department of Fine Arts of the Zurich University of the Arts (ZHdK) and the Kuratorium Ökologie (ZHdK) with the Migros Museum für Gegenwartskunst

In collaboration with the Department of Fine Arts of the Zurich University of the Arts (ZHdK), the Migros Museum für Gegenwartskunst hosts a series of talks with artists whose work is on view in the current exhibition Potential Worlds 2: Eco-Fictions. The two-part exhibition series Potential Worlds explores the relationship between humans and nature. The second part Eco-Fictions features works by artists who sketch visions of potential “new” worlds and demonstrate that we need concrete visions of the future for alternative ways of life to come into being.

Since the 1970s, Peter Fend (b. Columbus, OH, USA, 1950) has been developing artistic research projects and concepts dealing with environmentally friendly sources of energy and their fair distribution. In the conversation, he will talk about his projects shown in the exhibition and art’s capacity to spur a change of thinking in society.

In the exhibition he is represented with works from the 1970s as well as current projects. The collages Delancey Street Goes to the Sea I-IV (1979) illustrate the idea of directing rubbish from Delancey Street in Lower Manhattan to Jamaica Bay, in order to feed algae. The idea is then to employ the algae for producing biogas, so-called “sea gas.” Fend’s RAPID Methane Gas Station and Rapid Logo (2000) derive from his participation in the group project Rapid Response. The group thought up a model for gas stations, so-called “Post Petroleum Gas Stations,” which derive fuel from renewable resources and offer it for sale. In his most recent work, Towards a Better Use of the Dammed Reservoirs that Surround Dallas–Houston, USA, and Nizhny Novgorod, Russia, for an Ecological Competition (2020), Fend studies the ramifications of the use of reservoirs for energy generation. By juxtaposing the Dallas–Houston and Moscow–Nizhny Novgorod regions, Fend hopes to initiate a global race to develop ecological uses of hydropower that will prompt the deployment of alternative practices.

"I was, and remain, physically active. And I was, and remain, always curious. And I did, and continue to, scare people."
Peter Fend