exhibited: 07.03.–30.05.2026 MONA SCHULZEK, Birds sing at a higher pitch in urban landscapes, Galerie Elisabeth & Klaus Thoman, Innsbruck, AT;
10.07.2026–10.01.2027, Zu den Sternen! Weltraum und Weltflucht seit der Moderne, Arp Museum, Regamen, GER

The series „Chambers“ evokes technologies that orbit the Earth as space debris or disintegrate into glowing fragments when re-entering the atmosphere. These remnants point to human hubris – the desire to leave traces in space – and at the same time to the difficulty of controlling them.
Some of these decommissioned objects are deliberately brought down and sink to the seafloor in a remote region of the South Pacific. In great depth, a quiet archive of technological remains accumulates – a collection of capsules, parts, and structures that is hidden from view yet still speaks of our presence beyond Earth.
In the series I work with spherical mirrors to visually open the space and destabilize its orientation. The mirrors shift scale and dimension, fold inside and outside into one another, and produce distortions that call perception and spatial certainties into question. This creates the sense that reality is continually reshaped through gaze, technology, and projection. (Mona Schulzek)

For her first exhibition at Galerie Elisabeth & Klaus Thoman, Mona Schulzek developed the largest sculpture to date in her series Chambers, which has been ongoing since 2025. The metallic objects, produced in various sizes, consist of ring-shaped components that are wedged into one another. The artist assembled them from both used and new materials that she herself has worked on.
Tapering conically, these rings form central openings which, in the case of Chamber VI—conceived for Innsbruck—Schulzek seals with a round window and a semi-transparent, spherical mirror, condensing the structure into a capsule-like form. While the interior of the sculpture contains emptiness, the layering of the curved glass creates the optical effect of a human eye. The viewer is thus met with a gaze—complete with iris, pupil, and the upside-down reflection of their own image.
Two drogue parachutes, attached to the capsule by a thick rope, lie slack on the floor of the exhibition space. They evoke the impression of a space capsule that has just come to rest shortly after touching down on Earth.