Culture
Plastic art in the city museum
Monika Radhoff-Troll (Aachen) uses plastic bags and other consumer items for her artistic objects by cutting them into narrow strips and reassembling them. Bags from The New York Times, Monopol or Washington Post are intricately knotted in the traditional way and transformed into contemporary forms such as tapestries or cushions.
The former everyday objects are transformed into new objects that can be experienced by the senses - brightly coloured or in monochrome tones whose commercial origin is barely recognisable. Former advertising imprints or logos are so deciphered and fragmented that their original messages often only become clear at second glance.
In this way, Monika Radhoff-Troll resolves a contradiction in both form and content that is thought-provoking: How can such a cool and artificial material as plastic appear so soft and naturally moving? How can a material originally used for commercial purposes be transformed into an art object? These are questions that engage the viewer in a subtle, almost playful way and whose profoundly serious effect will not soon let go.