Art at Work - Frankfurt IBC-B
The Frankfurt collection in the „Individual Business Concept“(ibc) building –more than just a runner-up art display
The ibc building of Deutsche Bank is situated on a principal axis into the town centre. This complex of buildings is not only head office to the bank’s private and business clients but will also temporarily house nearly 3000 other colleagues from the twin towers headquarter buildings in a few months time. Preparations are ongoing prior to the arrival of those ‚new colleagues’ yet one can already see that the ibc will be an impressive place of work also due to its special art collection comprising of numerous works that were especially made for this particular location.
Spread over an area of 30,000sq meters more than 1000 staff work here in an environment shaped by glass, steel, natural stone and concrete. New open-plan offices and mobile work stations, so called ‘smart offices’, designed to support team work, brought new challenges for many including those of finding ways to display art within. But anyone who enters the seven storey light-filled atrium of the main hall, quickly discovers a successful symbiosis of art and work. Hovering high above the reception desk of the lobby, between the bridges which connect the North and South of the main hall, is Olaf Metzels’s gargantuan sculpture Cashflow.
Inspired by the Bezier curves, often seen as screensaver winding themselves across many computer screens, the artist translated its lattice structure into a three dimensional sculpture. “This curve structure”, Menzel says,” only appears when one is not working at the computer, when the person is not at her desk. I have taken up this motif and attempted to incorporate concepts of flexible ‘smart office’ work stations in my piece. Even in a ‘smart office’ one needs to take a break and switch off sometimes. Whether one is going on a normal errand or moving with one’s mobile work unit, my interest lies with those transitions and spaces in between.”
Similarly, subjects such as permanent efficiency, current work structures and electronic networked communication have inspired other works in the ibc. For example Andreas Schulze created a three piece mural consisting of spirals and balls which form the letters PBC because the building is the bank’s head office for Private & Business Clients, thereby transforming this world of employment into a surreal still life. Günther Förgs’s „Fensterbilder“ (Window Pictures) give an illusional view of the outside, whereas Hubert Kiecol’s type-face pictures establish a ‘transitional space’. Right in the middle of an open-plan office the artist Ina Weber installed an old fashioned English gentleman’s club, a glass anachronism including leather armchairs, wood paneling, recesses with books and a worn carpet upon which the artist carefully applied spilt coffee marks.
Heiner Blums’s digital signage system, entitled Wir und Wo: „You are here. Have a nice day”, greets the onlooker in the lobby of the building. This piece is made up of several displays throughout the site and display pixel-like portraits of staff members, thereby weaving an Ariadne’s thread through the building: “One can see a real and an abstract person simultaneously and believes one knows the person already. It was my aim to integrate the people who work here into a signage system in order to signal that we are also dealing here with interpersonal communication”, says the artist.
The ibc contains a further distinctive art piece by Karin Sanders, consisting of two white reflective rectangles hung to the immediate left and right of the entrance. Staff were initially greatly irratated, because, having just passed through a security check with an ID card they were then seemingly confronted with a second reflective security barrier. At first, no one was left unaffected by the white atmospheric wall pieces, yet the more pronounced the rejection became with some the more emphatic the approval was voiced by others. Everyone sees their reflection as they pass by and by this movement go through different stages of self-awareness. One has to show ones true colours, take a position, faced by an unexpected situation. The more extreme the lack of personal expression was, the greater the need grew for subjective commentary. What remains undisputed is, that the bank’s art had again succeeded in generating a discussion, which went beyond self reflection and insight and resulted in adding cultural value to their staff’s work-life experience.
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Deutsche Bank Frankfurt IBC-B
Theodor-Heuss–Allee 72
60486 Frankfurt
CSR-Art
Dr. Danielle Pippardt
Claudia Schicktanz
mailbox.kunst@db.com
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