GUNTER HAESE

Sculptures. Monotypes :  1959-2013

Opening 24th January 2013, 18:00 - 21:00

We are pleased to invite you to our first opening of the New Year on 24 January 2013 at 6pm, along with all galleries on FleetInsel . We will show a selection of sculptures and monotypes by GÜNTER HAESE, an artist we have proudly represented since 1986.

A contemporary of Piene, Uecker, Mack, and Tinguely, Günter Haese is an important representative of kinetic art. His sculptures are made of blackened or phosphor bronzen, gilded brass or copper. They attract the gaze of the viewer through their color and transparency, as well as their delicate structures. The starting point for these fragile objects are geometric shapes such as spheres, cubes, and cylinders and their modifications or variations. These abstracted and poetic objects are brazed out of metal springs, coils, gears, screws, thin metallic sheets, fine wires and grids, combined to create forms reminiscent of anthropomorphic figurations while simultaneously establishing cosmological dimensions. The special feature of Haese's small-scale sculptures is the movement. The works vibrate and tremble in air and space at the slightest movement or vibration.

Haese’s monotypes and frottages, produced between 1959 and 1960, were the precursors of his first freestanding sculptures, with only approximately 20 to 30 unique pieces created. These works are prints of plaster sculptures originally built by the artist and then transferred onto paper with black ink. The structure of the later sculptures is clearly visible in these two-dimensional works - from the gear wheels and spirals to the fine networks, giving impressions of buckles and stamped sheets.

Günter Haese was born in 1924 in Kiel. He studied in the master class of Ewald Mataré at the Düsseldorf Kunstkakademie together with Joseph Beuys and Erwin Heerich. In the 60s, his works are displayed in several  world known exhibitions and high-profile spaces. In 1964, he presented at Documenta III in Kassel. In the same year, he became the first German national to have a solo exhibition dedicated to him at the Museum of Modern Art, New York. In 1966, he represented Germany Pavilion at the XXXIII Venice Biennale. In 1969, he also participated in the Sao Paulo Biennial X. In the following years, Haeses’ works have been exhibited and collected in many national and international institutions including:  Modern Museum of Art, NY; the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, Tate Modern, Kunsthalle Düsseldorf, Museum Ulm, Kunsterneshus Oslo, Museum Boijmans van Beuningen in Rotterdam, Kunsthalle zu Kiel, and Kestner Gesellschaft Hanover.

Günter Haese lives and works in Dusseldorf.