ISA Genzken has been “art in training” since 1969 and has been a trained artist since 1977, which are almost 50 years of art, five decades, half a century. Since her early beginning she has never let herself be in its diversity and lust for discovery.
A versatile and complex overall work of Genzken-Kunst was created in this half century; Sculptures and installations, films and photo art, paintings, paper work and artist books in the very own genzken style.
This style has undergone some development in these 50 years. Art scientists see the early works of Genzken primarily influenced by minimalism and concept art ; In their early days, however, Genzken could not be confessed to a uniform concept, but kept the freedom for further development; within one work or overall.
Genzken does not make art for art , but art for and from life, characteristic of their work is therefore the use of different materials and objects.
Wood and plaster, epoxy resin and concrete and many other "art" fabrics, everyday objects and consumer goods, dresses and busts and toys and much more are processed almost all conceivable techniques, often until an unfathomable work is created at first glance:
The unfathomable variety in the factory and work by Isa Genzken
In 1973 Genzken produces serial, geometric images such as "The shape develops that each of the five colors touches any other color" and completes an artist book with Berlin architecture and street scenes in silver-gelatine printing.
In addition, she "Two Exercises" in the Konrad Fischer Düsseldorf gallery, but not because according to Bruce Nauman's instructions for mental exercises (which Genzken had previously met), no audience may be present.
May 1974 followed a stage performance "Two women in battle" , performed during the opening of the Rabe exhibition by Lothar Baumgarten and Michael Oppitz in the Konrad Fischer gallery. In 1975 Genzken worked on parallelograms and ellipsoiden, a slimmer, which was only leaned on the wall in 1976, worked on the wall leaning wooden sculptures and parallelogram pictures for their first solo exhibition in the Konrad Fischer Gallery, Düsseldorf.
In 1977 the following other ellipsoids in the hall of the Düsseldorf Art Academy, because the figures became too large for Genzken Studio in the Academy. Genzken trips to New York and Los Angeles enables the artists Dan Graham, Lawrence Weiner, Michael Asher and the musician Kim Gordon (later lead guitarist "Sonic Youth") to be teached.
The award with the Karl Schmidt-Rottluff scholarship freely freed Genzken in 1978 from every concern for personal maintenance and gave her the time to continue working on her ellipsoids in peace.
In 1979 Genzken made her first hyperbolo (gray-green hyperbolo 'Jülich'), photographed Hi-Fi equipment + cars for advertisements and a colorful series of shops from "Dry Goods Stores and Music Shops" during a New York trip and moved in with Gerhard Richter .
In 1980, Genzken traveled to New York to photograph ears from passers -by. In Germany, she receives the order for a joint in-situ artwork with a judge for the König-Heinrich-Platz subway station in Duisburg (which will only be completed in twelve years due to construction delays, so Berlin Airport and Stuttgart train station have worthy ancestors).
Since Genzken also received a scholarship from the Künste Berlin Academy with an art prize in 1980, it can continue working on ellipsoids and hyperbolos.
In 1981, Working with the Aerospace Group Messerschmitt-Bölkow-Blohm for the production of the "gray-black hyperbolos MBB" . It is the only work from the series of ellipsoids and hyperbolos, which was made from epoxy resin, approximately 10 meters long.
In addition, she continues the work on wooden ellipsoids and hyperbolos and photographs rock bands that appear in night clubs during a visit to New York. In 1982 Genzken further developed the ellipsoids, e.g. B. for the "red-yellow-black double-llipsoid twin" : Mon.ma/2qwezdb (photo from 1982, taken in Genzkens studio in Düsseldorf).
The expansion of the ellipsoid reaches a preliminary climax in the 28 meter long "red-gray open ellipsoid" . While in Darmstadt the exhibition at the Mathildenhöhe Institute, which belongs to the Karl Schmidt-Rottluff scholarship runs, Genzken travels to Paris to be there at the opening of the exhibition "Art Allenagne aujourd ́hui" in the Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris.
Like many other contemporary German artists, whose names today cause a transfigured expression on the faces of art fans. On this sensitive overview of German contemporary art, the ellipsoid in swimming pool length together with Raoul Dufy's murals "La Fée Electricité" (1937) is exhibited, Isa Genzken conquers paris: Mon.MA/2qxuamx next to Joseph Beuys.
In 1982 Genzken married Gerhard Richter in June, creates the first vertical hyperbolo called "Rossi" and develops her only ready made with the "world receiver".
During the 40th Biennale of Venice in summer 1982, Genzken shows ellipsoid, hyperbolos and a number of ear photographs as part of Aperto 82 (a part of the event organized by Tommaso Trini).
Her work is installed on a former shipyard (the Cantieri Navali) on the Giudecca archipelago in southern Venice. On Documenta 7 , four of Genzkens Ellipsoiden are also exhibited in Kassel, which were installed at the main town of the Documenta (in the Fridericianum Museum).
In 1983 Genzken began to model sculptures from sound, including in the plaster workshop of the Düsseldorf Academy, Mo.MA/2F8VCGQ (the picture shows Genzken when working on the "Rheinbrücke" in her Düsseldorf studio). At the end of 1983, Genzken moved to Cologne together with Gerhard Richter.
In 1984, Genzken continues to work in the Gipswerkstatt of the Düsseldorf Academy, e.g. B. on the first plaster sculptures such as "My Brain" , and experiments with cast sculptures such as "Müllberg" (plaster is poured through arranged objects that are removed after the plaster is solidified, the finished plaster sculptures are sometimes decorated with miniature objects or personal photos in order to clarify the scale and a possible architectural function).
In addition, Genzken travels to New York for the exhibition "An International Survey of Recent Painting and Sculpture" (works by 165 artists from 17 nations in the MoMA), where she Cologne art dealer Daniel Buchholz , who should become her life gallery owner and lifelong friend (while it is already popping in the arts, in 1984 Genzken and judges separate for the first time).
In 1985 Genzken penetrated with the plaster sculptures into architectural areas or names the non -huge sculptures in this way; After architectural elements such as the "Bank" ( Mo.MA/2COL0WT ), concrete sculptures of building types, rooms, church, facade (gallery, Mo.MA/2QXC9DG, Rosa Zimmer, Mo.MA/2ck2fjt , both 1987) will soon follow.
The concrete sculptures were completed in a public mandate for the sculpture projects in 1987 in 1987: "ABC" , a deliberately senseless goal passage from two house-high reinforced concrete squares, on which Genzken installed two more functional window-like steel frames.
ABC was set up on the site of the University of Münster; The artist had integrated the large sculpture into the building complex of the university library that they seemed to belong. If it remained unclear whether ABC should remove the war or was a harbinger of future expansion, that should have been exactly the artist's intention-just a "typical genzken" .
Art scientists consider ABC to be one of the most unforgettable sculptures in public space that were realized in the second half of the 20th century; Unfortunately, the employees of the University of Münster saw it differently and in 1989 ensured the destruction of the enigmatic sculpture.
But Isa Genzken may have been too busy to be annoyed; In 1987 she also had her first institutional presentation in New York ( "Juxtapositions" ) and the first exhibition with her future gallery Daniel Buchholz in Cologne ( "world recipient" ).
"basic research" is devoted to the thoroughly thorough genes ; In addition to paintings of her studio floor, which was brought onto the screen in frottage technology with oil, it comes window topic already mentioned in ABC (which it is already concerned with another window " (which is based on another window" (which is based on another window) until the windows in "Everyone needs at least one window" a little later for the exhibition theme) creates several suggestions for public sculptures and continues to work on their architectural concrete sculptures.
October 1988 Genzken's first museum tour started with seventy works; At the same time, Genzken focuses on her basic research in 1989 on the inside of the artist's head, whose X-rays are photographed and processed into black and white X-ray images, and she also begins to collect pictures from the news magazine SPIEGEL.
In 1990, concrete windows and other concrete objects and genzken began to paint on aluminum with synthetic polymer paint. In addition, Genzken installs the window to the world on the roof terrace of the Meert-Rihoux gallery in Brussels (a large metal frame called "Camera") and takes over a one-year visiting professorship for sculpture at the University of the Arts.
In 1991 further white-on-black X-rays follow; "SPIEGEL I" with 121 framed photos from the magazine is ready; The three -part sculpture "Family" is created (including a transparent epoxy resin on a metal grid structure until the mid -1990s basis for many work); For a competition, Genzken constructs a model for a Holocaust monument in Boston; Creates the conception for the public project "Wäscheleine for Frankfurt" (between two bank buildings in downtown Frankfurt, unrealized) and takes over a one -year teaching position for sculpture at the Städelschule in Frankfurt.
In addition, at an exhibition of the Karl Schmidt-Rottluff scholarship holders in the municipal art hall Düsseldorf, she exhibits concrete sculptures and installs as part of the "CrossRoad" of the Art Gallery of York University (6 artists are invited to create local sculptures) on the university campus in Toronto in autumn 1991 "Two Lines" (between three dormitories).
In 1992 Genzken in Chicago (during the stay to install their Midcareer retrospective "Everyone needs at least one window" in the Renaissance Society) took the photos for "Chicago Drive", paints MLR painting (March 1992 presented in the Daniel Buchholz gallery) and watered by Chicago's architecture-inspired concrete cubes.
It continues the work with epoxy resin; Send the exhibits "Window" , "X" , 4 X-rays and an MLR painting to Documenta 9; Installs the "Spiegel" on Willy-Brandt-Platz in Bielefeld, which still gives the Bielefeld town hall a framework today, and makes the film "My grandparents in the Bavarian Forest" .
photographed by Zefram, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
In 1993 Genzken worked for the first time with the artist Wolfgang Tillmans , the result is the photo series "Atelier" (which was created in Cologne Cathedral: bit.ly/2cdf0at ), after commissioning a public sculpture by the publisher and art collector Frieder Burda, designs her first grabed rose sculpture and separates from Gerhard Richter.
A large, two-part epoxy sculpture is shown on the 45th Venice Biennale, which Genzken had made especially for the exhibition.
In 1994 Genzken tested kinetic works, "hoods" , "red-blue column" and "red-green column" , made lamp paintings followed by lamp sculptures "heads in aspic" until the appointment of judges (for which she pours various plaster sculptures in epoxy resin and assembled on metals).
Your new work will be exhibited in the Daniel Buchholz gallery in Cologne; At the beginning of the winter, Genzken travels to New York and photographs architecture and city scenes of the Mega-City until February 1995.
In 1996 Genzken moved from Cologne to Berlin, rented a studio in Hoboken, New Jersey, where she completes the three bound collage books "I Love New York, Crazy City" and complements the collage series "Love as Beings" from sections from pornographic magazines.
Both works will be premiered in the exhibition "Metlife. Isa Genzken" in the Generali Foundation Vienna from September 1996, and more than forty works will be shown in various media. In 1997 with the "gay babies" of new, largely useless budget equipment in Genzken's first sculptures in assemblage technology; For the sculpture projects Münster 97, Genzken's sculpture "Fullmond" installed on the banks of the Aasee located in the city center.
In 1998 Genzken sometimes created "columns" (columns) named after friends, produces a series of collage objects from its own dresses and prints the photo series "New York, New York, NY." , while "Der Spiegel I" is exhibited in Berlin.
The year 1999 passes in a similar way, in 2000 Genzken moves into its existing studio in Berlin Charlottenburg. In the studio, one of these spacious Berlin old buildings between the factory, office and residential building, Genzken has finally found their window with a wide look: via the Berlin city highway, also in the green of 12 hectares of cemetery facility under monument protection and a large allotment garden, which has good chances with progressing climate warming, to be obtained as an urgently used cooling area.
Above all, however, the studio is very close to the plaster form of the State Museums Berlin, so Genzken can “around the corner” from absolute experts or commission as a special production and integrate them into their work.
In the new studio, Genzken continues the work on the "Columns", spends a month in New York in autumn, where she prepares your exhibition in the AC Project Room in a rented studio near Wall Street (several architecture models such as "Deutsche Bank Proposal", which also tell of previous stays in New York) and developed one for a competition from the city of Berlin with the architect Roger Bundschuh Design suggestion for an inner -city bridge.
The musical notes on the balustrade, which compose the song "This is the Berlin air" , were unfortunately withheld from Berlin, but Genzken will process them in a series of wall sculptures entitled "Notes" .
That was a short and more incomplete overview of the topics that Isa Genzken dealt with until the turn of the millennium . Stay to be discovered for a few more years, ISA Genzken has no less worked between 2000 and today, but created "long ranks of her best works" ...
With all of her changes in life to perfection, ISA Genzken has set standards that only gifted artists reach with a huge sense of the zeitgeist.
Keywords: forms of expression of art, the free style of free artists, art and reality, Isa Genzken sets standards
