Dagmar Lippok

In sports, especially in football, pennants are well known objects: before kickoff, the captains of the teams meet at the centre circle, shake hands and exchange the pennants of their clubs. A ritual which conveys identity and symbol of camaraderie between the teams that are but a few moments away from facing each other as rivals on the pitch.

Sports teams and societies of firemen, musicians or carnival revellers and many more treasure unique guidons which fabrics, colours and symbols show the history of their origins. They differ from pennants in that they are more complex, bigger and in their original function: in the military, they served as identifier for the different military units while being visible from far away.

Dagmar Lippok combines those two elements in an excerpt from her work „knight‘s hall“: three club pennants from matches of the BVB against Eastern-European teams that adorned the trophy wall of the fan project Dortmund during the 90s are enlarged by a factor of 10. Pennants become guidons and hint at the connection between football and military. This connection can also be seen in the language used in football: the shot, the offensive, the defence, the squad. High up in the BraUturm, the top floor of the Dortmunder U, the view over the city‘s rooftops is reminiscent of that from a castle‘s keep, which offers an elevated view over the lands and provides an advantage in defending. The synergy of all those aspects in Lippok’s work creates an interesting ambiguity between harmonious coexistence and war imagery.

Dagmar Lippok (*1963 in Sokolov, CZE, lives and works in Dortmund) studied Object and Interior Design at the FH Dortmund. Her works displace people into an emotional test setting tempting to be utilised and broach the issue of complex topics linked to the respective location. During the World Cup of 2006 in Dortmund, Cologne and Gelsenkirchen she implemented the art project “marketenderin”, based on the medieval term for women who were responsible for the care and support, as well as the physical and medicinal treatment of soldiers. On top of that, Lippok realises inclusive and participative projects as for example The group exhibition love/love in the Künstlerhaus Dortmund in 2023.

Artist Website
Instagram: @dagmar.lippok

Text: Linda Schröer
Translation: Matthias Fabry
Photo: Jens Sundheim