Fabian Knecht
Lachen ist verdächtig (Laughing is Suspicious)
Vienna Digital Cultures, Foto Arsenal Wien
Vienna, Austria
May 22—Sep 6, 2026
Opening: May 21, 7pm

Lachen ist verdächtig (Laughing is Suspicious), 2022–present, looks at first like an abstract textile work: a mesh of frayed green fabric strips, knotted by hand. But the camouflage net Fabian Knecht has suspended from the roof of Foto Arsenal Wien was not made in the studio. It was knotted in Ukraine by civilians from old clothes, curtains, and scrap fabric, meant to conceal vehicles and positions and to save lives. Knecht does not collect these nets as relics. Working with Ukrainian aid organisers he has partnered with since the full-scale invasion in 2022, he exchanges them on site for professional-grade material.

At Foto Arsenal Wien, the work gains another layer. The grounds remain marked by the Museum of Military History and its surviving military structures, and Knecht’s net meets these older monuments to war with something quieter — a vulnerable, hand-made object that insists resistance is also collective labour.