How much openness can art allow? What happens when an artwork leaves the protected space of the museum and enters the midst of everyday life?

accepting rides with strangers is the first comprehensive monograph dedicated to the work of artist Esther Strauß. The publication accompanies Denkmal für Schnee (Monument to Snow), a poetic response to the climate crisis. A delicate brass inscription bearing the three words Denkmal für Schnee transforms an unnamed Tyrolean mountain peak at an altitude of almost 2,700 metres into a pedestal for the last snow that will ever melt on its summit.

Working with scores, the body, movement and encounters, Strauß creates performances and installations that open up situations in which memory, vulnerability, trust, birth, death and loss are brought into negotiation. Many of her works emerge at thresholds: between private life and the public sphere, between action and image, between documentation and experience.

The title accepting rides with strangers points to an artistic attitude that embraces exposure to the unknown. Strauß’s art does not seek the safety of distance. Instead, it places its trust in the risks inherent in encounters, in the power of simple gestures, and in the possibility of transforming reality.

With contributions by Rosanna Dematté, Brigitte Felderer, Michael Hirsch, Andreas Rudigier and Nina Tabassomi, and a conversation between Sabina Holzer and Esther Strauß.

The book was designed in collaboration between Matthias Schmidt and Esther Strauß.