| There is a problem with architecture. It is always there; it is inflexible; it is wrong. The good thing about art is that it is always there; it is flexible, and it is right. As Wolfgang Weileder’s works emerge, they materialize as houses, then disappear. They don’t bully their way into existence as architecture does. They are big, then they are gone. The house-projects, developed over as a series at four different sites in Newcastle, Madrid and Birmingham between 2002 and 2004, were his first major case-in-point. Initially, the project consisted of the building and un-building of the exterior walls of two English terraced houses | 
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Jorn Ebner
Wolfgang Weileder, House-Madrid, 2004. Gelatin silver print, 79 x 100 cm. Courtesy of the artist and Workplace Gallery, U.K.There is a problem with architecture. It is always there; it is inflexible; it is wrong. The good thing about art is that it is always there; it is flexible, and it is right. As Wolfgang Weileder’s works emerge, they materialize as houses, then disappear. They don’t bully their way into existence as architecture does. They are big, then they are gone.
The house-projects, developed over as a series at four different sites in Newcastle, Madrid and Birmingham between 2002 and 2004, were his first major case-in-point. Initially, the project consisted of the building and un-building of the exterior walls of two English terraced houses. Once one wall was up and the second wall was being erected, the first wall was taken down again. Once un-built, the third wall was going up, and the second one was coming down —and so on and so forth until the four walls of the potential house were un-completed. As house-projects reached Birmingham, they were no longer single houses, but terraces.
The houses of house-projects were shells, erected in a pedestrian zone, on a pavement, or in a city center, yet they were always built by professional builders and included protective fencing with commercial signage. While one passes by, the first impression would be one of an ordinary building site. This direct encounter with the work of art in the street reflects the present-day politics and economy of home ownership-obsessed Britain.
For his upcoming project fold-up, the issue is taking a different formal turn. Rather than constructing time-based structures in constant flux, the work will be semi-permanent. An exact replica of an English townhouse, looking like an unfinished paper cut-out, will be wedged into an empty plot.
When in 2006, Transfer was created in the center of Milton Keynes—a quasi-American grid system-based new town outside of London—this full-scale replica of a cultural institution was confronting a consumerist public with its cultural assets, asking if it will acknowledge them.
Ownership of culture is not a priority; ownership of a credit card is. Banks materialize in the simple forms of ATMs. For 2008, Weileder will realize an abstracted ATM that releases a small note once every day over a period of one year. For the city councillors, this implies danger; the site might become a public congregation point. For Weileder, though, the aspect of communication is an underlying premise for his works. His projects are intended to act as platforms for discourse about the lived environment and its social implications. After all, the projects have provided an educational opportunity for vocational studies; amongst his builders were often apprentices, too.www.house-projects.com
www.transfer-project.org
www.fold-up.info
