Tapeti

The two-color silkscreen print reflects Deller’s longstanding practice of using posters and editions as a central artistic medium since the early 1990s. For him, prints are independent works that consciously position themselves at the intersection of art, music, politics, and everyday culture. Formally, the silkscreen print, with its minimalist, high-contrast design, draws on the aesthetics of woodcut prints. By combining an initial letter with a pictorial symbol, it simultaneously evokes associations with classic ABC books for children. This impression underscores the emphasis on legibility and circulation—central aspects of Deller’s understanding of art as a social medium.

The bat motif appears simple at first glance but unfolds a multi-layered field of meaning. When Deller received the Turner Prize in 2004, he dedicated the award (among other things) to bats as an ecologically significant species in an interview with the German weekly Der Spiegel. In late 2006, he also initiated the Bat House Project, a publicly announced architectural competition for a bat house on the outskirts of London. Deller has also explored political interpretations of the motif—such as a connection between bats and George W. Bush—in earlier works.

Furthermore, the bat alludes to Deller’s longstanding engagement with sound and music. The animals’ echolocation calls, which serve to orient them in space, can be compared to electronic sound structures. This connection between natural phenomena, technology, and pop culture runs as a recurring motif through his work. In his typically witty manner, the work simultaneously opens up a specifically Austrian resonance space: the association with Johann Strauss’s operetta Die Fledermaus links Deller’s international visual language with the bliss of Vienna, the metropolis of the waltz.

Text: Heike Maier-Rieper, 2026

Translated with DeepL.com (free version)