GÜNTHER UECKER

Biography

All artists

biography anchor

GÜNTHER UECKER

BIOGRAPHY


Born
1930 Wendorf, Germany

Residence
Düsseldorf, Germany

From 1949 on Günther Uecker studied applied arts in Wismar and Berlin-Weißensee before moving to West Germany in 1955, where a scholarship enabled him to study at the Düsseldorf Art Academy under Otto Pankok from 1955 to 1957. Later, from 1976 to 1995, he held a professorship at the academy himself. The use of nails for his works of art became his trademark.

He created his first nail pictures in 1957 and from 1962 applied this technique to everyday objects. He was primarily interested in the light and shadow effects created by the three-dimensionality, which was also expressed in the light objects that he created as a member of the artist group ZERO, that was founded by Heinz Mack and Otto Piene, he joined in 1961.In search of alternative concepts and materials to overcome traditional painterly means, Günther Uecker went on many journeys, including to the Sahara, the Navajo Reserves of Arizona, Russia, Siberia and Mongolia. He experimented with sand, water, electricity and metal. His so-called ‘ash paintings’ were created under the impression of the reactor disaster in Chernobyl. Numerous exhibitions and book publications convey a picture of the breadth of his artistic work, which in addition to object art also includes watercolours, stage sets and sculptures.
In search of alternative concepts and materials to overcome traditional painterly means, Günther Uecker went on many journeys, including to the Sahara, the Navajo Reserves of Arizona, Russia, Siberia and Mongolia. He experimented with sand, water, electricity and metal. His so-called ‘ash paintings’ were created under the impression of the reactor disaster in Chernobyl. Numerous exhibitions and book publications convey a picture of the breadth of his artistic work, which in addition to object art also includes watercolours, stage sets and sculptures.

Günther Uecker has received several prestigious awards, such as the Kaiserring of the city of Goslar, the B.Z. Culture Prize, the Federal Cross of Merit 1st Class, and the Pour le mérite for science and the arts, among others.

EXHIBITIONS (selection)

1958
–Das rote Bild, Studio Heinz Mack and Otto Piene, Düsseldorf
1960
–First solo exhibition at Galerie Schmela, Düsseldorf
1962
–nul , Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam
ZERO-Demonstrations in Düsseldorf
1964
–ZERO-presentation Lichtraum , documenta III, Kassel
1965
–The Responsive Eye, Museum of Modern Art, New York
1968
–documenta IV, Kassel
1972
–Solo exhibition Kestnergesellschaft, Hannover
1977
–documenta VI, Kassel
1970
–German Pavillon, 35th Biennale di Venezia
1972
–Amsterdam Paris Düsseldorf Guggenheim Museum, New York (group show)
1988
–Retrospektive Günther Uecker, Central House of Artists, Moskow
2003
–Berlin/Moskau, Martin-Gropius-Bau, Berlin
–Kunst and Krieg, Neue Nationalgalerie, Berlin
2015
–ZERO. Die internationale Kunstbewegung der 50er and 60er Jahre , Martin-Gropius-Bau, Berlin
– Solo show Uecker, K20, Düsseldorf

MEDIA