Opening Tonight! Ulrich Gebert, "The Negotiated Order," at Winkleman Gallery and Sigrid Viir in the Curatorial Research Lab
Urlich Gebert
The Negotiated Order
June 1 - June 36, 2012
Opening: Friday, June 1, 6 - 8 PM
The Negotiated Order
June 1 - June 36, 2012
Opening: Friday, June 1, 6 - 8 PM

Winkleman Gallery is very pleased to present “The Negotiated Order,” our second solo exhibition by German artist Ulrich Gebert.
Furthering his series of works dealing with the human urge to dominate
nature, and the often-ludicrous extremes we’ll go to in that pursuit,
Gebert offers here a striking suite of mixed media works in which found
photographs of humans systemically subordinating or controlling animals
have been reworked so only the human is still visible. The resulting
images make the humans look ridiculous, underscoring how such so-called
scientific efforts generally reveal more about human culture than they
do nature.
Each of the works in The Negotiated Order
series includes a manipulated found image (produced as a silver gelatin
print) “framed” within a hand-distressed canvas ground. Formally, the
suite of works references both minimalist paintings and vintage
photography, lending the series as a whole a calming, seemingly
scientific authority. By removing the object of the presumably
understandable human activity in each image, though, Gebert introduces a
subtle, and at times very humorous, uncertainty about what we’re
observing.

Ulrich
Gebert lives and works in Munich, Germany. He received his Masters in
Photography at Royal College of Art, London, and studied at the Glasgow
School of Art and with Timm Rautert at the Academy of Visual Arts in
Leipzig. Recent exhibitions include a solo show at KLEMM’S
in Berlin; an exhibition at the DZ Bank Kunstsammlung in Frankfurt and
at the Kunsthalle Recklinghausen. His work has been reviewed widely in
Europe and the United States including in The Village Voice and ArtNews.
And in the Curatorial Research Lab

I
don’t know Sigrid Viir. I have not interviewed her until now, just
looked at her work. She neatly overcomes the first problem of a young
artist. She grabs our attention, first of all with a sharp, almost
vicious sense of colour that insinuates itself straight into the blood
stream, but also by posting the photographs as part of a sculpture
installation. This is not just about packaging, but is a way of
reframing the way we are used to thinking about art works. She is trying
to tackle the oldest dilemma of photography: when the shutter closes,
it stops time. Today, our concept of a work of art is changing rapidly,
against the understanding of art as a single, stilled moment captured by
a solitary genius. Sigrid Viir appears to be part of this mutation.
[…]
I walked around her installations, which forced you to stand at
different angles. Sometimes the structures were very similar to easels.
There was a temporary edge to it. They were awkward. How could you live
with these? And the world inside the photographs was confused with
objects stacked in bizarre ways, filed dysfunctionally, arranged as if
the inhabitants of the land within them were very different from us.
[…]
There are references to other art. One thinks of Rebecca Horn, or
earlier kinetic art. In the colours and her sparing use of shapes, there
is more than a whiff of the wunderkind of the moment, Elad Lassry. As
I’ve said, I don’t know Sigrid Viir, but while I am look at her work, I
am constantly expecting a surprise.
--Excerpted
from “I Don’t Know Sigrid Viir,” an interview with the artist by
Alistair Hicks, Senior Curator, Deutsche Bank. From the catalog Sigrid Viir: Selected Works, 2012, published by Temnikova and Kasela Gallery, Tallinn, Estonia.
Sigrid
Viir was born in 1979 and lives and works in Tallinn, Estonia. In
addition to multiple group exhibitions throughout Europe and the United
States, Viir is a member of the highly acclaimed three-artist collective
Visible Solutions LLC, whose work is included in Manifesta
9, which takes place in Limburg Belgium, June – September 2012. In May
2012, Viir was the recipient of the Pulse Prize, given every year in
recognition of an outstanding solo project in the New York art fair.
Viir is represented by Temnikova and Kasela Gallery in Tallinn, Estonia.
For more information, please contact Edward Winkleman at 212.643.3152 or info@winkleman.com.
1 Comments:
I like the June Show Edward. Ulrich is firing on all Cylinders. Super clean with a wierd elegance and the perfect amount of restraint, plus the Mysterious Factor.
Sigrids work is very very interesting you can't go wrong with beautiful white Castors I have a Castor fetish. I am seeing a trend in sculpture I like were its going.
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