Untitled, 2000, intervention in the city space

In his recent artistic interventions Marcus Geiger has delved into the concept of the "art work" as such and provocatively questioned its significance. "My theme is space in its confrontations with art", he says. His project for Manifesta 3 involves covering with pink paint the area between Cankarjev dom, the largest Slovene cultural and congress centre, and the Nova Ljubljanska Bank. The coloured surface refers both to the public space and the actual location of the work. In this way an extreme contrast is highlighted between the activities and consequent distribution of power (organisation of cultural production on one hand, and the surveillance of one's life through capital on the other). The space in between is therefore loaded with many different connotations. Although Marcus Geiger covers the surface of such a public square with pink paint, he is not a painter. Neither does he offer a direct interpretation of the work. For the artist, the monochromatic surface is conceptually based 'just' on the range of colours available for commercial use, numbered and recognisable through a code. The two basic colours of red and white, clearly distinguishable and standardised, are carefully mixed and thus transformed with the idea of defying the risk of being loaded with meanings and associative references.