Moritz Matschke: Branched Assistences

Moritz Matschke works as a visual artist, freelance teacher and senior artist at the Institute for Art and Education at the University of Art in Linz.

In "We have never been modern", Bruno Latour argues that modernity is based on a paradoxical double movement: On the one hand, it makes a strict theoretical distinction between nature and culture; on the other, it continually produces hybrid forms that in fact undermine this separation. Houseplants are an example of such hybrids. They are living beings with independent growth processes, but at the same time culturally and technically mediated through their colonial history, breeding, global commodity chains and domestic care routines. The plants used in the installation are on loan from the Vienna waste disposal site in Ottakring. They are houseplants that have been disposed of but salvaged and "resocialized" by employees.

Opening: Wednesday, April 29, 2026, 5 pm
Artist talk: Wednesday, May 6, 2026, 7 pm