Pae White

In 2007 Pae White brought a sample of her home country California to Münster. Instead of the folkloric tunes that can usually be heard in the city’s historic centre, for the period of the Skulptur Projekte exhibition she had a different set of tunes played on the three glockenspiels there. A compilation of melodies that reminded Pae White of the period of her own awakening of love was performed. As an extension of the project idea she also had three bells cast that incorporated the imprint of an embrace and were installed in Münster’s botanical garden. In addition, in the front window of Café Kleimann on Prinzipalmarkt, the artist presented tacos and miniature taco trucks all made of marzipan and arranged on typical Californian paper plates inside traditional confectioners’ boxes.

Her unusual marzipan creations referring to the fast-food culture of her home state of California sat like aliens among the traditional pastries and Westphalian cakes. The new musical repertoire of the carillons playing in the old town also disconcerted passers-by. Beyond the region Münster is not known either for its marzipan or its glockenspiels, yet for the artist these two things shaped her image of the city.¹ It gave Münster residents the chance to discover something exotic within their own familiar environment, while White implanted what was familiar to her into a different surrounding.

Ronja Primke

¹ Anna Sophia Schultz, “Pae White,” in: Brigitte Franzen, Kasper König and Carina Plath (eds.), sculpture projects muenster 07, exhib. cat. LWL-Landesmuseum für Kunst und Kulturgeschichte, Münster, Cologne, 2007, p. 287.