Ist das Leben nicht schön?
Group exhibition in 4 chapters
Chapter 2: Wilhelm Sasnal
June 21 September 3, 2006
Opening: June 20, 7 pm
Press conference: June 20, 11 am
Iñaki Garmendia
June 7 August 13, 2006
Martha Rosler Library
May 30 August 13, 2006
Frankfurter Kunstverein
Steinernes Haus am Römerberg
Markt 44
D-60311 Frankfurt am Main
T. 49 (0)69 219 314 0
F. 49 (0)69 219 314 11
post [at] fkv.de / www.fkv.de
The second chapter in the year-long exhibition project Ist das Leben nicht schön? at the Frankfurter Kunstverein in 2006 will be a show with the Polish artist Wilhelm Sasnal. It will combine some of his most impressive early paintings with several new works produced during the last year, as well as four films. The exhibition is the result of a collaboration with the Van Abbemuseum in Eindhoven and represents the most comprehensive solo presentation of Sasnals works in Germany.
The paintings of Sasnal offer the viewer the possibility to study the relationship between reality and visual clichés. In his works he interprets the cultural and political changes that Poland has undergone since the 1960s. He investigates the collective imagination of his own generation living in a new society caught in its own past, but nonetheless looking to the future. The sources for his figurative painting include real places and personal imagery, as well as images created by the media, popular culture and even urban myths. The reduced formal vocabulary and emotional distance of his paintings work to level the used images, letting only the title of the work disclose its personal content.
Together with the large selection of canvasses, the exhibition will present four new films by Sasnal: Marfa (2005), Nowa Huta (2005), Brazil (2005) and River (2006). The films can be seen as a continuation of the interests he works with in his paintings. The four films have been produced from footage made in Krakow and during his travels last year in the USA and Brazil. They all revolve around his interest in pop music and a fascination for the myths that are created around certain places and countries.
Wilhelm Sasnal was born in 1972 in Tarnow in Poland. He studied at the academy of fine arts in Krakow, where he now lives and works. His works are represented in several important international collections, such as the Saatchi Collection and the Centre Pompidou, and he has participated in exhibitions worldwide, latest having a solo show in the Van Abbemuseum in The Netherlands.
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Also in the house:
Speaking of Others is the general title of a platform project running over two years in the Frankfurter Kunstverein in parallel to the main exhibition program. In this context, international initiatives will be invited to the Kunstverein, thus giving artists, curators and other cultural agents the opportunity to present their ideas and work.
The first two projects invited to the Speaking of Others platform are the exhibition of two new video works by Iñaki Garmendia and the presentation of the Martha Rosler Library.
Iñaki Garmendia is one of the three winners of the Visual Arts Prize, Gure Artea, which the Basque government awards every second year to the production of contemporary art. In the framework of Speaking of Others, the Frankfurter Kunstverein will present two new video works by the artist, Red Light / Straight Edge (2005) and Izarra (2005). Pop cultural themes play an important role in Garmendias work, as well as questions of social identity and the possibility or impossibility of cultural communication. As a starting point for his work, he often uses the specific Basque context that forms his background. The idea of music as a wider form of communication that is able to transcend this context is an important theme for him.
The Martha Rosler Library is open to the public on the second floor of the Frankfurter Kunstverein. Martha Rosler is one of the most prominent North American artists today, and an important critical voice as well. Besides her art practice she has, during the last four decades, been accumulating a library of close to 10.000 volumes, including everything from cartoons over social sciences to art theory. Initiated by e-flux, the library project will, in collaboraion with Revolver Verlag, Frankfurt am Main, take a new shape in the Frankfurter Kunstverein. A full catalogue of Roslers library will be published by the Revolver Verlag later this year. In June and July, Jessica Silverman, student at the California College of Arts, will be present to activate the library with events and talks.
For further details of the program and for information about talks and events, see: www.fkv.de
Frankfurter Kunstverein
Steinernes Haus am Römerberg
Markt 44
D-60311 Frankfurt am Main
T. 49 (0)69 219 314 0
F. 49 (0)69 219 314 11
post@fkv.de / www.fkv.de
Opening hours: Tuesday Sunday 11 am 7 pm
Public guided tours every Thursday 6 pm, or by appointment.
The exhibition series Ist das Leben nicht schön? is kindly supported by the Hessische Kulturstiftung.
The exhibition with Wilhelm Sasnal is kindly supported by Dresdner Bank.
Speaking of Others is kindly supported by the German Federal Cultural Foundation.
The exhibition with Iñaki Garmendia is kindly supported by the Basque Government, Department of Culture.
The Martha Rosler Library is a collaboration with e-flux and Revolver Verlag, Frankfurt am Main. The presentation of the library has been made possible through the kind support from Sparkassen-Kulturstiftung Hessen-Thüringen as well as 1822-Stiftung der Frankfurter Sparkasse.
