Cologne. The 57th "Art Cologne" is aimed at beginners and experienced collectors alike. At the oldest art fair for contemporary art , current styles are intertwined with those of classical modernism and post-war art. It will take place again until November 10th in the Deutz halls 11.1 and 11.2, south entrance, near the S-Bahn.
175 gallery owners from 24 countries present works by the artists they represent, carefully selected. A common reason for the selection: an exhibition by the artist in a well-known institution that has garnered recognition.
Art Cologne is particularly attractive because the art market is currently rather subdued in the top segment. There are a few rare pieces worth millions here, waiting for the financially strong collector. But most of the works are in the five- and six-figure range. And even art lovers with a very small budget will find something to their liking.
Paul Henkel is a gallery owner in New York and grandson of the Düsseldorf collector Gabriele Henkel the sake of the market," says Henkel , explaining his second participation. "In addition, the artists exhibited offer many collectors a great opportunity to discover new talent."
This time, trade fair director Daniel Hug has brought a breath of fresh air into the halls. This can be seen in the expanded “Neumarkt” section. Hug has brought together 26 young, innovative galleries here this year. Neumarkt is international and offers interesting young discoveries. “This is the future!” says Hug happily. He has abolished outdated rules. Anyone who has a good program is invited, regardless of how many years the gallery has been around.
If you are on a smaller budget at the Cologne exhibition center, you shouldn't miss the editions of the art associations. But you should also find out which program of which gallery suits you - and ask specifically about works on paper. Or ask to see editions. Both are cheaper than a canvas work or installation. If you are afraid of getting lost on the two floors with thousands of works of art and different styles, you can take a guided tour. One-hour art tours cost 15 euros in addition to the ticket. Can only be booked digitally.
His art is captivating - strong colors in clear tones and geometric shapes, held together by rhythm and feeling: Jean Dewasne is no stranger in Germany either. After all, the Frenchman designed the underground station of the main train station in Hanover 40 years ago. The Sprengel Museum in Hanover will soon be remembering him again. The trade fair flaneur will find this lively master of abstract constructivism at the stand of the Parisian Galerie Lahumière . It flanks Dewasne's works with non-representational art by the German Günter Fruhtrunk and the American Nicholas Bodde. A cross-generational dialogue that is emotionally gripping and conveys energy.
Sometimes Vivian Greven clearly marries antiquity with the pop aesthetics of the digital age , sometimes the tension between two individuals remains vague, as in the kiss series with the symbolic title ")(". Greven's glazed oil paintings can be found at the stand of the Düsseldorf gallery Kadel Willborn.
Contemporary painting at its finest can be found at many booths. Colour is everything, there is no need for a picture narrative in Peter Zimmermann's layered, luminous abstractions at Nagel Draxler. Thomas Müller's extremely three-dimensional images of waves or other dynamics are tempting at Florian Sundheimer. At Schlichtenmaier, a modern Medusa head by Cornelia Schleime takes over. It is evidently the result of a meal with seafood. Uwe Henneken has dipped his large landscape format "Farewell to Nemi" in an unreal turquoise-green, which can be found at the Gisela Capitain gallery in Cologne and Naples.
Lazar Lyutakov, a native of Bulgaria, lives in Vienna. The Charim Gallery is bringing one of his installations to Cologne that requires a longer look. The artist has collected lava lamps from all over the world from all over the world, from all different trend cycles. He uses them to stage laboratory-like experiments. "In the lava lamps we see abstract expressionism in motion. As a symbol of the counterculture of the 1960s and thus of resistance, they also became a commodity," says the Viennese gallery Charim. Due to their ability to create organic chaos, the lava lamp was used in the 1990s to generate random numbers in technology companies in Silicon Valley. This is also indicated by the name of Lyutakov's lava series: "1 Million Random Numbers".
Every year, trade fair director Daniel Hug brings in promising new voices. They no longer have to have proven themselves for a certain number of years. Just two years ago, Alex Flick, son of the collector Mick Flick, opened the Gathering gallery in London. Even younger is Super Super Markt from Berlin. This is the gallery of Julius Jacobi, the son of Georg Jacobi, a collector from Cologne. Super Super Markt draws attention to Oskar Enberg's "Magic Flute", an allusive installation with a bitten apple, twigs and a flute. The New Zealander creates gripping images for concepts and stories. Also exhibiting for the first time are the Lucas Hirsch gallery from Düsseldorf, LC Queisser from Tbilisi and Lehmann + Silva from Porto. Positions are presented here that are likely to become important.
A life without art would be unthinkable for Karen and Christian Boros. Since 2008 they have lived in a converted bunker in Berlin-Mitte. There they show groups of works by international artists from 1990 to the present in 80 rooms. With foresight and courage they decide on positions before they become mainstream. They do not shy away from political content or crude aesthetics if they are enthusiastic. They want to be challenged by art. The Koelnmesse and the Federal Association of German Galleries and Art Dealers are awarding Karen and Christian Boros this year's Art Cologne Prize. Both have made a valuable contribution to the communication of contemporary visual art. There have already been over 50,000 tours through the bunker.
Anyone looking for a radical and challenging path in art rather than pure decoration should also visit a few galleries for media art at Art Cologne. The Gisela Clement Gallery from Bonn spans the spectrum from the emancipatory Elvis pictures by Ulrike Rosenbach from the 1960s to the ethical questions of the much younger artists Louisa Clement and Anouk Lamm Anouk.
Louisa Clement's work is about the human presence in the artificial and the artificial presence in the human. Clement's robot alter ego collides with self-portraits that show the traces of life in an unvarnished way. Rosenbach has added her own photo to a famous shooting picture by Andy Warhol with Elvis Presley. Rosenbach has now reprinted the couple aiming at the viewer, for the first time in water green.
Hardly any exhibitor concentrates as consistently on media art as Anita Beckers from Frankfurt. At most other galleries, videos and photos hang between paintings, the currently dominant art form. At Dittrich & Schlechtriem, a photo of market favorite Julien Charrière appears. At Ron Mandos, one is drawn to the portrait photos of the highly sensitive video artist Isaac Julien . At the stand of Dr. Dorothea van der Koelen from Mainz and Venice, the video "Splash (blue)" by Fabrizio Plessi attracts the eyes of strollers.
Things have gone quiet around the versatile painter, sculptor, book artist and poet Michael Buthe (1944–1994). The Judin Gallery in Berlin is changing that. On the occasion of the 80th anniversary of his birth, it is dedicating a solo stand in bright blue to the multiple “Documenta” participant, a color that was very important to him. Museums are now rediscovering the former Düsseldorf professor. Recent buyers were the MoMA in New York and the Städel in Frankfurt.
The Utermann galleries in Dortmund, Thole Rotermund in Hamburg, Valentien in Stuttgart and the von Vertes gallery in Zurich have strong paintings and works on paper by German expressionists. Heinrich Campendonk, Erich Heckel, Alexej Jawlensky , Gabriele Münter and Emil Nolde are put in the right light here. The work of Josef Scharl is also unmistakable , always expressive and surprising. Relief-like in the application of paint, idiosyncratic in the design, Scharl is far too little known. The reason: Scharl, who was defamed by the Nazis as "degenerate", emigrated to the USA in 1938 and never returned. The Hagemeier art dealer in Frankfurt manages Scharl's estate and is presenting a selection in Cologne.
Paul Henkel opened his Palo Gallery in New York in 2018. For his second appearance in Cologne, the grandson of Düsseldorf collector and art patron Gabriele Henkel has chosen three artists. The figurative work of Lewinale Havette, Natalie Frank and Nell Brookfield is about mythology, folklore and fairy tales and occasionally also about the belief in spirits from West Africa. At the stand, which focuses on similarities and contrasts, the powerful coloring and violent gestures of the images immediately captivate the viewer.
In the “Collaborations” section, the gallery Corbett vs. Dempsey from Chicago is teaming up with JUBG Space from Cologne. Both are drawing the visitors’ attention to their joint artists Roscoe Mitchell , Hedwig Eberle and Matthias Schaufler.
Roscoe Mitchell has been an important American composer and jazz musician since the 1960s. Mitchell is praised as someone who is constantly bringing new ideas to jazz. He has recently conquered new artistic terrain. It was only during the pandemic that Mitchell began making totemic paintings and collages. To do this, he combines abstract elements with highly stylized figuration, using fabrics and the aesthetics of the Aboriginal art of indigenous peoples, which, depending on the viewer's point of view, have sometimes been criticized as primitive and sometimes celebrated as authentic.
