Urban artists paying homage to innovators from the history of art
Judith Supine / Christian Awe / Jonathan Yeo / Helle Mardahl / XOOOOX / Kevin Earl Taylor / Anton Unai / Jaybo Monk / Adriana Ciudad / Stefan Strumbel / Marco “Pho” Grassi
VS.
Gustav Klimt, Giovanni Battista Tiepolo, Pablo Picasso, Damien Hirst, Andy Warhol, Pierre Soulages, Henri Matisse, Théodore Géricault, James Ensor
Preview: January 20, 7-9 PM / Exhibition: January 21 to March 5 2011 / Tue - Sat 12 - 6 PM
In this exhibition artists from all over the world take reference to some ground breaking artists of the past. An hommage to the spirit of innovation, non-conformity and alternative thinking of the older days.
Art looks back on a history that is as multi-faceted and fascinating
as our own time. Among the illustrators, designers, sculptors, painter,
calligraphers, fashion designers and architects of
the past millenia, new avant-gardes constantly emerge, establishing
themselves to be replaced soon enough by the next generation craving
innovation. A process of creation that naturally
builds upon preceding aesthetics, concepts and techniques, that
deconstructs them in order to create a contemporary art-remix. Many
artists eschew this conscious connection to history.
Freely and radically, they create new approaches: the new art.
When, in the early 20th Century the French-American artist Marcel
Duchamp declared a common urinal to be a work of art, a scandal was
unleashed in the art world. Duchamp’s
radical new interpretation of the concept of art provocatively put into
question the more aesthetic process of creation in the visual arts up
till then. He ultimately prevailed with his
intellectual approach and in so doing, influenced important art
historical currents such as conceptual art, Dadaism and Surrealism.
There is now a movement underway worldwide that could again be seen as the precursor of new currents in the art of tomorrow. Call it street art, new art, urban art if you want - anyways those artists don’ t want to be put in an art historical box for now. They believe in less academical art structures. They made their own way to develop and find their art. Inspired by urban subcultures like graffiti, street art, graphic design, punk music or avantgarde fashion they developed a real passion, strong enough to work everyday by own motivation on the development of their techniques, artistic style and message. With this self taught attitude they found a unique position in the contemporary art world.
curated by Johann Haehling von Lanzenauer