Kitty Kraus
30 Jan - 06 Mar 2010
KITTY KRAUS
Galerie Neu / BaliceHertling
January 30th – March 6th 2010
Opening reception: Friday January 29th 5-9 pm
Galerie Neu presents Kitty Kraus at Galerie BaliceHertling as part of the Berlin/Paris gallery exchange. Kraus's spinning Lidl bar is a work of the strictest formal restraint that fills the whole room with an energetic tension.
Kitty Kraus's earliest artworks made from supermarket shopping cart handles are extremely modest and incomparably solemn: a metal bar just a few centimeters in diameter, simply laying on the floor, with the logo of the supermarket chain, Lidl, in blue and red on a yellow background. One must be careful not to accidentally step on it. However, the bar could be easily picked up and is sufficiently heavy enough to become a bludgeon, potentially causing severe wounds -- the simple ready-made becomes almost menacing.
This impression of implicit danger appears with unexpected aggressiveness when the Lidl bar is attached to the ceiling by a rotating cable. When the motor is off, the bar simply hangs. But when the transparent cable begins to turn, the bar lifts into a horizontal position until it spins at eye level with the observer, forcing him or her to keep a certain distance to prevent injury. Observed from this distance, the work reveals its elegance, a characteristic that fulfills Kraus's formal intentions. The Lidl logo fades with the constant movement and the bar, turning, produces a uniquely visual presence: a cone of imaginary lines seems to float in space.
During the past few years, the work of Kitty Kraus has been presented in numerous solo exhibitions and international group shows. Most recently, her work was included in Intervals, a series of individual exhibitions at the Guggenheim Museum in New York dedicated to promoting young artists. Kitty Kraus is also presenting her work at the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum in Hartford, Connecticut from February 4 to May 2, 2010. In 2008, she received the celebrated Blue Orange art prize; the catalogue, published by the Kerber Verlag editions for the occassion, presents an overview of her work from the last few years.
Galerie Neu / BaliceHertling
January 30th – March 6th 2010
Opening reception: Friday January 29th 5-9 pm
Galerie Neu presents Kitty Kraus at Galerie BaliceHertling as part of the Berlin/Paris gallery exchange. Kraus's spinning Lidl bar is a work of the strictest formal restraint that fills the whole room with an energetic tension.
Kitty Kraus's earliest artworks made from supermarket shopping cart handles are extremely modest and incomparably solemn: a metal bar just a few centimeters in diameter, simply laying on the floor, with the logo of the supermarket chain, Lidl, in blue and red on a yellow background. One must be careful not to accidentally step on it. However, the bar could be easily picked up and is sufficiently heavy enough to become a bludgeon, potentially causing severe wounds -- the simple ready-made becomes almost menacing.
This impression of implicit danger appears with unexpected aggressiveness when the Lidl bar is attached to the ceiling by a rotating cable. When the motor is off, the bar simply hangs. But when the transparent cable begins to turn, the bar lifts into a horizontal position until it spins at eye level with the observer, forcing him or her to keep a certain distance to prevent injury. Observed from this distance, the work reveals its elegance, a characteristic that fulfills Kraus's formal intentions. The Lidl logo fades with the constant movement and the bar, turning, produces a uniquely visual presence: a cone of imaginary lines seems to float in space.
During the past few years, the work of Kitty Kraus has been presented in numerous solo exhibitions and international group shows. Most recently, her work was included in Intervals, a series of individual exhibitions at the Guggenheim Museum in New York dedicated to promoting young artists. Kitty Kraus is also presenting her work at the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum in Hartford, Connecticut from February 4 to May 2, 2010. In 2008, she received the celebrated Blue Orange art prize; the catalogue, published by the Kerber Verlag editions for the occassion, presents an overview of her work from the last few years.