beer tales, 2024

Beer bottles, 24 front and back labels, beer crates, vinyl foil
Variable dimensions

beer tales is a fictional beer brand project created by Selina Zürrer. For the exhibition at the Hotel Tiger, beer bottles were labelled with 24 different labels that are individually designed.
The labels are divided into four thematic categories: BA (Beer Ads), BH (Beer History), AW (Alewives) and CW (Caliban and the Witch), each with six distinctive motifs. The front of each show a dry point print made by Zürrer, while the back contains an explanation of the subject depicted.
The full and chilled bottles of beer are offered at the usual Offspace price. Empty crates are placed near the bar for the collection of empty bottles.

By appropriating the beer brand, beer tales sheds light on the historical significance of women in the brewing trade, an area in which they dominated for centuries until social changes and the mechanisms of emerging capitalism displaced them and beer was considered typically male for a long time. The project also alludes to the myth that the western image of witches is strongly characterized by English alewives who were accused of witchcraft.

beer tales builds on the research initiated in "Don’t worry darling, you didn’t burn the beer!", shifting it from a print-based installation into a social and distributive format.