Sonia Leimer – «Perlen»
Location:
Dorfpark, Bahnhofstrasse 17, 5300 Turgi
Vienna-based artist Sonia Leimer (*1977, ITA) explores the materiality and transformation of our immediate living environment. Her artistic practice revolves around the question of how spatial interventions can make societal change and the history of specific places visible and tangible. Trained both as an architect and an artist, Leimer focuses on the perception and negotiation of space as a key aspect of her work.
For ART FLOW, Sonia Leimer has created a site-specific sculptural group for the village park of Turgi. Her work, titled «Perlen», refers to the once-thriving Swiss paper industry – and in particular to the village of Perlen in the canton of Lucerne, where the country’s last newspaper paper factory is still in operation today. During her research, Leimer engaged deeply with the industrial processes of this production site – a symbol of deindustrialization, which has significantly shaped the Limmat Valley over the past decades.
Using deinking sludge and pulp, both by-products of newspaper manufacturing, she formed three large-scale sculptural objects. Their circular, rolled shapes recall the playful handling of paper scraps while also raising complex questions about resources, media, and industrial heritage. The sculptures speak of flow, of movement and transformation – weaving together the story of papermaking with the currents of water.
At the Turgi site, the works also point to the latent potential of former industrial zones: «Perlen» reminds us that disused production spaces can be reimagined – and transformed into cultural places of the future.
Photos: Viviane Barbieri