Following an invitation to develop a duo work for the exhibition series in the Quartier, the artists Vanja Smiljani? & Lukas Marxt conceived a scenery from some of the works that already existed, transforming the space into an almost scientific research laboratory and confronting the visitor with visual and acoustic impressions in equal measure.
In the collaboration, an interplay of a video work by Lukas Markt and Vanja Smiljani?’s interest in analog technologies and Sci-Fi-Povera sculpture emerged.

The exhibition ECHOES FROM THE SKY originated from the film CURENT SHOT 02 – a collaboration between Lukas Marxt and Jung An Tage – which shows the simulation of an avalanche.
A sound developed for the film by Jung An Tage created an acoustics that was amplified at one point in the room. This place was only protected for each visitor individually. Vanja Smiljani? & Lukas Marxt developed a concave-mirror microphone and a futuristic seat frame from which the film could be viewed and the absolute sound could be experienced. Sound mirrors are analogue amplifiers that were first developed during the First World War before the invention of radar. They were used to detect incoming enemy aircraft by amplifying the noise of their engines.

With this staging, the exhibition space was transformed into a kind of scientific research laboratory with its own unique atmosphere. Here the attempt to contact the universe and be able to perceive a plane which is normally denied to us should be made possible.
In her lecture performance, which Smiljani? developed for the exhibition, she started from the given situation in space and tried to find an alternative use for the reflective objects by trying to diffract the light waves – a reflectivity – by visiting a physical experiment.

In their working methods, both artists want to trace the incomprehensible, the magic of the nuances, the supernatural in the here and now and seek to grasp them.