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24/1/2002

Erwin Wurm

Neue Galerie, Graz

In its first phase, the development of sculpture in the 20 century was characterised by detachment from the human body. In Brancusi's work, the human head becomes increasingly geometric and ultimately egg-shaped. This process was called abstraction, meaning abstraction from human dimensions.

After this phase of loss of the human proportion in sculpture, this 'dehumanisation' as the process was referred to in conservative cultural critique, followed the second phase, the concretisation of sculpture. All things could be called a sculpture: sculpture as an object from urinal to bicycle. In the 1980s furniture established itself as part of the sculptural world of objects. The abstract object became an article of everyday use. Furniture sculpture was both an object of everyday use and sculpture.

As a consequence the human body re-entered the picture. Using furniture meant sitting on it etc, hence anthropomorphism and the world of the concrete met in contemporary sculpture. Wurm was one of the pioneers of this act reconciliation. His use of media such as video and photography is unique. These media allowed him to introduce new parameters of sculpture such as duration alongside the classic ones like gravitation, weight, statics, stability, equilibrium, materiality and form. Human bodies, connected with objects and holding positions they could only maintain for minutes, are ideal expansions of sculpture into the field of media.
Peter Weibel

Image: Erwin Wurm, without title, 6 Pullover-Sculptures, 2000

Exhibition site: Neue Galerie Graz, Sackstrasse 16, 8010 Graz
Opening times: 26th January - 31st March 2002
Tue - Sun 10am - 6pm, Thu 10am - 8pm

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