January 20: Here, at this time of year, whenever there is a suitable break from the heat and wind, there is burning-off by the Country Fire Authority, the ‘firies’, in order to reduce fuel that might otherwise intensify potentially devastating wildfires that occur as a matter of course in the height of the Australian summer.

Alexander Tutsek-Stiftung gallery in Munich opens lebenswelt / life-world, contemporary sculptures by Japanese artists with photographs by the Japanese artist Rinko Kawauchi  (born in Shiga, Japan in 1972).

She images the destructive and at the same time rejuvenating power of fire. Her succinct, reductionist landscapes depict traditional controlled slash-and-burn land clearance to address the relationship between people, nature, and time.

In addition, Rinko Kawauchi focuses on gentle disturbances of everyday life; her personal experiences of the landscape. Without explanation, they serve as meditations.

The title of the exhibition lebenswelt / life-world alludes to the phenomenological concept Lifeworld (Lebenswelt), a universe of what is self-evident or given, that subjects may experience together. For philosopher Edmund Husserl, it is fundamental to all epistemological enquiry.

[NOTE: Today’s post is a short placeholder due to temporary lack of bandwidth preventing internet research and document retrieval]