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until 31.03. | #1832ARTatBerlin | Galerie Mutare presents from 2nd February 2018 the exhibition “Painting, graphics, objects – Diversity, dynamics and provocation” with art from 5 decades on the occasion of the 80th birthday of the artist Erika Stürmer-Alex.
On the occasion of Erika Stürmer-Alex’ 80th birthday, the Berlin Mutare Gallery shows a part of her multifacetted work: Abstract pictures, expressive objects and installations as well as graphics can be seen from 2nd February to 31st March at Giesebrechtstrasse 12 in Berlin-Charlottenburg.
Erika Stürmer-Alex is a versatile and adventuresome artist. Her multi-facetted work is characterized by great diversity, cannot be fixed on just one style. The painter Herbert Behrens-Hangeler (1898-1981) has had a considerable influence on her work. He and Kurt Robbel (1909-1986) were her teachers at the College of Visual and Applied Arts in Berlin-Weißensee. She also took inspiration from German Expressionism, post-war abstraction and Pop Art.
Erika Stürmer-Alex, „Blauer Sitzender”,
1971, Öl/Hartfaser, 110 x 118 cm
Nevertheless, the colour of her work appears soft, almost velvety, but full of radiance, her shapes and figures are expressively contoured. Non-art materials play a prominent role in her objects and installations. She uses various everyday materials, such as packaging, especially styrofoam and others plastics, finds, stencils, ink rollers and colourful plastic toys to create playful combinations, which are cheerful and often surreal. This is how her colourful installations, assemblages, paintings and synthetic sculptures describe the everyday life and the world from the artist’s point of view. The Museum Junge Kunst in Frankfurt/Oder once wrote about her: “The artist seems to have found the gate of paradise to the playing child- but her sense of proportion, rhythm and spatial relationships did never get lost.”
Erika Stürmer-Alex has almost spent all her life in East Germany. Today she still operates the Kunsthof Lietzen where she is painting and and also leading a learning community.
Her work was even exhibited in the USA and a self-portrait of her is currently to be seen in the exhibition at the Museum Barberini. She painted it in 1981 – A time which was characterized by the humiliations of the Stasi and the ban on leaving the GDR. Erika Stürmer-Alex’ life is also a story of East and West. This self-portrait will later be seen in the Mutare Gallery as part of the exhibition.
Erika Stürmer-Alex, „Held“, PUR-Schaum,
Latexfarbe, Fundstücke, ca. 32 x 39 x 19 cm
Background:
Erika Stürmer-Alex, born in 1938 in Wriezen, studied painting, graphics and architectual art at the University of Fine Arts in Berlin-Weißensee from 1958 to 1963. She completed study visits in London and Rome as a guest of honour of the Villa Massimo and also in Brazil, where she led a symposium. She was co-founder of Endmoräne – Female Artists from Brandenburg and Berlin e. V. “and a member of the artist group kg 849. Today, Erika Stürmer-Alex lives and works in Brandenburg.
Her work has been shown in numerous exhibitions, e.g. in Berlin, in Potsdam, in the Castle Neuhardenberg, in Cottbus, Leipzig, Frankfurt/Oder, and even in Denmark. Currently her self-portrait is shown in Potsdam, in the Museum Barberini, “Behind the mask. Artists in the GDR “. In 2015, Erika Stürmer-Alex was awarded with the Brandenburgische Kunstpreis – the honorary prize for a life’s work by the Prime Minister of Brandenburg.
Her works are in public possession as well as in private collections, for example in the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin / Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, the Nationalgalerie Berlin, in the Museum Junge Kunst, Frankfurt/Oder, Kleistmuseum, Frankfurt/Oder, in the Brandenburgische Kunstsammlungen, Cottbus, in the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden, in the Museum of Fine Arts, Leipzig, in the Staatliche Museen Schwerin, in Kent State University, Kent, Ohio (USA), in the Department of Art Saratoga Springs / New York (USA), in the Chagas Freitas Collection, Brazil …
The vernissage begins on February 2, 2018 at 07:00 p.m.. Erika Stürmer-Alex will be present. Christoph Tannert introduces the exhibition.
Vernissage: Friday, 2nd February, 07:00 – 08:30 p.m., the artist is present. Laudatio: Christoph Tannert
Exhibition period: Friday, 2nd February to Saturday, 31st March 2018
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Image caption cover image: Erika Stürmer-Alex, „Held“, PUR-Schaum, Latexfarbe, Fundstücke, ca. 32 x 39 x 19 cm
Exhibition Erika Stürmer-Alex – Galerie Mutare – Contemporary Art – Kunst in Berlin | ART at Berlin
