Lara Favaretto’s objects and installations are characterized by a minimalistic style, yet by conscientiously embedding her work in a carefully selected location, she gives it a strong social and political impact. By using materials such as stone or metal, her objects initially convey the sense that they are designed for a much longer space of time. However, Favaretto’s art disappears at the end of an exhibition when it is either dismantled or completely destroyed.

Favaretto’s ongoing series of Momentary Monuments has been executed in various forms since 2009. For the Kunstplatz Graben, she chose a hollowed-out granite boulder. Her monument is empty at the beginning of the exhibition and meaningless in the best sense of the word. Normally public monuments or memorials refer to a particular event or a historical person to keep their memory alive in current discourse. Donations are usually collected before monuments are erected to pay the commissioned artists. Favaretto, however, changes the normal process and reinterprets certain functions. In particular, the object’s temporary existence as well as its destruction and reuse are diametrically opposed to the concept of institutionalized monument conservation.

Furthermore, there is a little slot in the stone that money can be dropped into. At the end of the exhibition the stone will be destroyed, the resulting gravel reused, and the collected money donated to charity. The artist has decided to give the money to SIETAR Austria - a non-profit organization that promotes intercultural interaction. The charitable aspect of Favaretto’s work produces a strong sense of contemporary relevance, which, in a broader sense, critically reflects on the relationship between art and politics.
Abridged version of the original text by Nico Anklam