Adolfo Schlosser with Chiqui Abril, Carlos Alcolea, Carlos Varona, Santiago Auserón, Pierre Bonet and others

Recorded in Madrid, Piamonte Street, circa 1978
Digitization from tape: Sergio López
Project support & organization: Marisol Abascal & Robert Lepenik

Thanks and/or greetings to: Marisol Abascal, Lieserl Schlosser, Eva Lootz, Jacobo Schlosser, Juan Schlosser, Marina Stiegler-Lepenik, Chiqui Abril, Carlos Alcolea, Carlos Barona, Santiago Auserón, Pierre Bonet, Sergio López, Yolanda Riquelme Garcia, Dennis Helwig, Bureau Le Fou

Cover: "Piedra Cosida" (photo: Eva Lootz)

Label: Bureau Le Fou: BLF 008

Adolfo Schlosser was born in Leitersdorf, a very small village in eastern Styria in 1939 and was an Austrian painter, sculptor, and poet. After studying at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna, he lived in Iceland for four years to devote himself to painting. During this time, he also worked in deep-sea fishing. The intense experience of northern nature had a strong influence on his artistic development. His artistic work in general was shaped by his intense contact with nature.

In 1967, he moved to Spain, where he lived and worked until his death in December 2004. Absurdly, he was a highly respected and well-known artist in Spain and received the National Prize for the Plastic Arts in 1991, while remaining unknown in Austria. In his later sculptural works, he mostly used natural materials such as stone, clay, wood, or straw, often creating unusual combinations of them.

In the 1970s, Adolfo Schlosser began building instruments from natural materials. His companion and friend Chiqui April, director of the Buades Gallery, described that the music project began with the sculpture "Piedra Cosida", a stone which Adolfo covered with the skin of a goat. It reminded Adolfo of a parachute and he wanted to use the stone to perform a flying movement. They then discovered that the stone and its skin produced a sound.

At the Madrid School of Ceramics, there was a large ceramic kiln with more than 15 meters height. Adolfo planned to hold a concert there with water sounds and a sculpture hanging from the ceiling entitled "The Ear of Silence." This project was never realised, but it was the starting point for the meetings in Via Piemonte, where they made music with these homemade instruments every wednesday and recorded most of it with a tape recorder. Alongside Adolfo were Chiqui Abril, Carlos Barona, Carlos Alcolea and occasionally other musicians such as Santiago Auserón and Pierre Bonet.

In February 1979 there was a concert at the Buades Gallery in Madrid, featuring instruments created by Adolfo. The musicians were hidden behind a large white cloth, and the audience could only hear the sound. In doing so, he followed his aesthetic proposal to "reinvent" music through silence. After 1978, the project fell dormant, and the recordings were never used or released. In 1990, Adolfo created a sound installation called "House of Fire". The concept was about a fireplace that emits the sounds of the inside of logs when they are burned in a campfire.

Adolfo Schlosser was my uncle, my mother's brother to be precise. I also spent many wonderful days of my childhood in his birthplace, Leiterdorf. I remain very close friends with his widow Marisol and his daughter Lieserl, despite the physical distance between us.

Marisol provided me with over 10 hours of recordings, supplied me with information and photos, and accompanied me through this project with such warmth and patience - it is only thanks to her that this publication is possible!

Robert Lepenik, November 2025

Images:

01 Adolfo Schlosser playing one of his instruments, circa 1978 (photo: Eva Lootz)

02 The large ceramic kiln from the Madrid Ceramics School, where the Water Music Concert was to take place in 1978

03 La Oreja Del Silencio (1976)

04 Adolfo Schlosser working on "Piedra Cosida" (photo: Eva Lootz)

Video: Contribution from the cultural program "Imagenes-Arts Visuales" on Spanish television TVE on 21.02.1979