“Form Follows Function – about the question whether a better life is awaiting us somewhere. Sun, air and house for all! Utopia or a figment of the mind”, drawings of luxury villas with a slick, modern design situated in serene-looking landscapes; these dream-like drawings seem to promise peace and prosperity, but at the same time the vast empty spaces and the minimalistic interiors seem slightly uncanny… “The sheer beauty of vastness, transparency and modern design and architecture classics in the graphics by Josephin Ritschel are the privilege of the few. This environment stands in palpable contrast to the housing realities for those affected by housing shortages, gentrification, rising rents, and Homelessness.
This publication If You Lived Here makes reference to Martha Rosler’s exhibition project at the Dia Art Foundation in New York (1989) with the same name. Based on the slogans of popular real estate billboards of that time, Rosler’s dialogic and participative show addressed urban and socio-political questions about housing as a public act of community and the distribution of space as a fundamental question of power”, comes with a double-sided poster showing various types of scaffolding (41,5 x 59,5 cm unfolded), soft cover, 28 x 20,5 cm, 26 not numbered pages, ed/200, Berlin 2019
