A Bottle and Some Honest Friends

Oak table, Glasses and Schnapps, 2014

Taking Kaspar von der Sitt’s late sixteenth-century Passauer Liedertisch (Passau Song Table) as a starting point, A Bottle and Some Honest Friends is a drinking table which was temporary sited within the apricot orchard of a schnapps distillery in Mühldorf, Austria.

The table was designed with five friends as they drank and features carved texts from poems and songs including Carmen Burana, Robert Burns and Anacreon. The work is a reflection on drinking as a ritual which breaks down social barriers.

Here’s, a bottle and an honest friend!
What wad ye wish for mair, man?
Wha kens, before his life may end,
What his share may be of care, man.

Then catch the moments as they fly,
And use them as ye ought, man:
Believe me, happiness is shy,
And comes not ay when sought, man.

Extract from A Bottle And Friend, Robert Burns, 1787

Commissioned by Stefan Tasch and art:phalanx as part of Struktur & Organismus IV