MILAN – SCHÄCHTE
Teeth of steel on drums two meters in diameter, dig out a wall of coal and rock – roaring, crashing, and gnashing, in the midst of dense clouds of dust and water droplets.
The drums advance and retreat 320 meters, shearing the coal between the roof and floor – while a water mist suppresses the dust and gases.
Big and small chunks of coal come crashing down, with a bang, on to a chain conveyor in a steel pan.
The foreman, with yellow plugs shoved into his ears, is underground, in a shaft, one thousand one hundred meters.
Deep in the earth.
Wir wracken nicht,
wir hacken mit hangenden
Nacken Im wachsenden Schacht
Bei Tage, bei Nacht
“ In this work I attempted to put myself in the distinctive characteristics of the miners and their home – the underground world.
This hidden space, which never sees the light of the day, consisting in labyrinths, mines, tunnels, galleries, and caverns. It is not just a source of coal and rock, but also a world of sound suggestions, where is possible to get the authentic pulsation of the Earth with his unique rumble of pein.
„Schächte“ investigates into the noisy and inimitable scenery of mining, dense of history and existence “ metaphors”.
Andreas Golinski