First sculptures were created beginning in 1989, cast in black wax or in concrete combined with found objects. Pedestals often consist of original or reconstructed pieces of furniture. Rest on Chest are three carved wooden objects that can be stowed in their own pedestals.

“Some of these objects acquire a slightly surreal character. For example the one which Schwander calls Digestion, which dominantly stands in the center of the room and evokes all sorts of associations: a whisk, a found object like many of the things Schwander uses in his works, is cast into a large teardrop shape made of black paraffin in such a way that the whisk protrudes like a handle out of the top of the whole thing.
Schwander combines found objects with basic forms cast out of paraffin or cement in many of his works, not only in the example described here. However, the found objects are not always as clearly identifiable as in this work and are often implemented for formal rather than substantive reasons–old pieces of iron, old nails, found somewhere in nature and now inserted into a new context as weathered and rusted material, the sense of which lies more in an atmosphere than in a clearly nameable fact.”
Niklaus Oberholzer

The pedestal itself was thematized in three large-format works for an exhibition at the Kunstmuseum Luzern (Urs Fischer, Claudia di Gallo, Markus Schwander, Ugo Rondinone, 1992).

“Markus Schwander inserts two contrasting objects into this spatial body. One of the objects is assembled from bent concrete components. The other consists of differently high-legged, closely set boxes and chests of drawers. Together they form a single body, which is covered with a layer of wax. The furniture refers to the atmosphere of the room, the concrete forms to the construction site. Inside and outside are thus both targeted.”
Maria Vogel