Sixteen hands clad in white cotton gloves run over the exterior facade of the Aue-Pavillon. As the fingers palpate the undulating surface, their guide Dorothea Ullrich describes the architectural highlights of the glasshouse edifice and its position relative to the Orangery, the Karlswiese meadows and the Baroque park. Her description is very vivid: “The layout traces the shape of the letter J – only with corners.” Over the past few days she has specially prepared for today’s guided tour for the visually impaired and the blind. Her key challenge lies in rendering her depictions as accurately as possible in order to ensure that the features are imbued with form, colour and dimensions and that their material surfaces become clear. And she does it with great aplomb. The artworks and their manner of presentation in the rooms soon start to take shape in our mind’s eye. Similarly, noises and smells also play an important role. As a silent observer, I have been permitted to take part in this experiment, and consequently I am endeavouring to put myself in the position of having to gain access to art merely through verbal descriptions and my sense of touch.

The group walks around the exterior of the pavilion before heading towards Ai Weiwei’s Template. On their way, Dorothea begins to paint a picture of the object for the participants: “The huge wooden sculpture looks like a star which turned on its own axis before collapsing like a house of cards.” A musty odour reminiscent of an old antique store, an old church or a barn assails our nostrils. And for the first time I become aware of the strong smell emanating from Ai Weiwei’s Temple. A part of the air-conditioning system is whirring loudly as we are permitted to walk between the sculpture’s collapsed wings and past the barrier. Dorothea tells of the day on which the temple collapsed. With his trouser legs rolled up, Roger Buergel trudged through the puddles left by the storm and alerted the artist. When a young woman expresses difficulty in imagining how the monumental sculpture looked before it keeled over, our guide then furnishes a more detailed account: “From above it looks like a star with eight points. Each wing is made of antique wooden doors and windows which are arranged together in five layers.” That certainly helps. As the members of the group tap lightly against decaying material redolent of ages past, and run their fingers over the five layers, the dark, austere strains of Saâdane Afif’s guitars can be heard from afar. “Shall we step inside?” invites our guide.

As we approach the entrance to the Aue-Pavillon, she offers helpful directions: “First straight ahead, then cut a sharp curve around the puddle.” Some of the tour party have impaired vision whilst others are completely reliant upon accurate descriptions. Once inside the pavilion, Dorothea begins to paint a picture of the room: the curtains, lined with aluminium threads to protect the artworks from exposure to the incoming light, and the coarse red concrete floor. They begin by touching Ricardo Basbaum’s installation: “Here right in front of us is a sculpture made of metal, mounted on a set of rising platforms – which in reality looks like an arena.” Hands glide over the cage-like metal surface. “The carpet is bright green. But we have other strong colours here such as orange and blue”, adds our guide. Alluding to the sound of the eight monitors, she asks, “Can you hear that dull monotonous humming?” As Dorothea provides more background information, the video shows a group of men rhythmically hammering on one of Basbaum’s steel objects.

She then steers the group towards the next work of art: Dmitri Gutov’s Fence. The members of the tour party run their fingers along the loops of the wire fence’s various characters and letters, which resemble a form of calligraphy, and trace the outline of the metallic reproductions of hand-written inscriptions from Beethoven, Marx and Engels. Our guide then walks over to Ines Doujak’s Victory Garden. Her voice is easy on the ear, and it is a pleasure to listen to her evocative descriptions: “In front of us stands a bed raised onto stilts. It is a 16-metre-long concrete trough supported by thin wooden legs which seem about to snap any moment. Inside there is a bed of grass and over sixty bags of seeds. Actually, it looks like a large centipede.”

Now I try an experiment: As we arrive at Romuald Hazoumés Boat, I close my eyes and concentrate on listening to the guide’s descriptions. Deprived of sight, I suddenly become keenly aware of the sounds in the room, which I have to filter out to ensure that they don’t drown out everything else; the chatter of children, footsteps, sneezing and the fragments of conversations between visitors are all competing with Dorothea’s explanation of oil smuggling in Benin. Her voice mingles with the sound of the guitars – still faintly audible from afar. Yet the smell of the various materials is also perceived more acutely, as is the smell of the concrete floor and the iron girders in the pavilion. Without actually being able to see the boat in front of me, my mind’s eye is filled with evocative images of the fate of the people whom Dorothea is now describing. “Is that clear enough for you, or should I give a more detailed account?” she enquires.

Now Black Chords is growing louder, rising above the ambient noise. As we approach closer, the strain of the guitars begins to dominate Afif’s black-draped room. “Is this din too loud for you?” “Yes”, they reply in unison. “The darkness and these plangent chords are dampening our spirits”, remarks the man with the white stick and an escort. “The whole room here has something menacing”, interjects a woman. The changing chords approach relentlessly and then recede on all sides into an indeterminate direction. Without the benefit of sight, one loses all sense of orientation in the room.
 
“Are there any burning questions you wish to ask or comments you’d like to make?” Dorothea enquires of her guests in the concluding discussion. A man accompanied by his wife gives his impressions: “Even if I can only touch a part of the artworks, I can have the rest described to me and gain a better picture - particularly in terms of the materials and textiles used.” And he is right. There is something sensual and directly experiential about it. For me as a sighted person, the guided tour was a very special experience. The works take on a quite different intensity when your eyes cannot help, when you have to focus on the descriptions and rely on your sense of touch.

The next open guided tour for the visually impaired and the blind is scheduled to take place on 20 August 2007 from 10 am to 12 noon. Our visitors’ service will be glad to answer any enquiries you may have about this tour or special group tours.
Tel. +49 (0) 1805-11 56 11.

Claudia Jentzsch