FERAL is an artist living and working in Southern Germany and Central Italy.
FERAL is an artist living and working in the Alpine foothills of Southern Germany and the Apennine mountains of Central Italy.
The main body of his work comprises multi-species art performances taking place in difficult to access wilderness regions. FERAL's performance art offers unique perspectives on the natural world and invites us to rethink the relationship of modern man and nature.
Oftentimes FERAL tries to contrast civilized urban existance and pre-historic life within his performances. He draws his inspiration from several different cultures of the Paleolithic age. By fusing elements of stone age hunter-gatherer tribes with modern civilized culture he creates his vision of a ‘‘contemporary/future primitive’’ - while giving the word ‘‘primitive‘‘ a positive connotation.
„Urgent appeals to upend history, to change situations from negative to positive, can best be articulated in all their complexity through live performance, in scenes that confront the underlying mercilessness of real events. For it is the license to draw on a range of media without restriction that allows artists to rearrange the facts, to imagine reconciliation, to create poetic spaces for personal visions, cultures and rituals.“ Goldberg, RoseLee: Performance now. Live art for the 21st century. Thames & Hudson 2018, p. 112-113.
FERAL's multispecies art performances could be described as such rituals. They are multifaceted attempts to rediscover the animal within our human selves and could be described as personal exercises in both dehumanization and rehumanization at the same time.
The hunt III, 2022-2023
Multi-species performance, foothills of the Bavarian Alps, Germany
Simulated spearhunt
Artifacts:
Spear-thrower „Sprung“: wood
Throwing spear „Hauch“: wood, antler, sinew, feathers
The hunt II, 2021
Multi-species performance, foothills of the Bavarian Alps, Germany
Simulated spearhunt
Artifacts:
Spear-thrower „Schwinge“: wood, bone, leather, cord
Throwing spear „Blick“: wood, antler, sinew, feather
Knife „Hauer“: wood, obsidian, birch pitch
The hunt, 2019-2020
Multi-species performance, Bavarian Alps, Germany
Simulated bowhunt
Artifacts:
Bow „Geist“: wood, leather, metal
Arrow 1 „Schatten“: wood, obsidian, plastic
Arrow 2 „Blitz“: wood, glas, plastic
Scraper „Biss“: wood, obsidian, birch pitch
Becoming Elk, 2019
Multi-species performance, Olympic National Park, Washington, USA
Tracking, stalking and ‘becoming’ elk
Memorial for an ancient society, 2019
Wood, boar skulls, fox skull, cord
Shelter II, 2018
Multi-species performance, Allgau, Germany
Three nights spent in shelter of leaves, branches and straw; fed on wild plants, berries, nuts and tree bark
Ghostbag, 2018
Deer rowhide, leather, feather, dried healing plants, leaves, edelweiss
Wolfsmahl, 2018
Multi-species performance, Apennine mountains, Central Italy
Interaction with wild boar carcass eaten by wolves
Treasure Casket, 2017
Deer rowhide, reindeer leather, bones, dried plants, jay feathers, flower chafer
Domestication is the antithesis of life, 2016
Sheep skull with bullet hole from cattle gun, found in mountain forest in the Austrian Alps
Mosseater / Mistweaver, 2015
Multi-species performance, alluvial forest, Germany
Exercise in de- and rehumanization
Shelter, 2013
Multi-species performance, Allgau, Germany
Three nights spent in shelter of leaves, branches and straw; fed on wild plants, berries, nuts and tree bark
The Mantle, 2012
Multi-species performance, Šumava National Park, Czech Republic
Metamorphosis into an elemental being of the forest
Artifacts:
Garment made of wild boar jaw, deer antlers/fur, bones, feathers, wood, fern, mud, clay, cotton
Ymir/Bones, 2012
Bones, feathers, fern, wood, clay
Five Seers, 2011
Five deer skulls, feathers, fern, clay
Bonebook, 2009
Inscribed deer bones, acrylic paint, soil, leaves, cardboard