Merrill Wagner
08 Mar - 20 Apr 2013
Merrill Wagner
Stone and Steel
8 March - 20 April 2013
Konrad Fischer Galerie Berlin is pleased to announce the exhibition "Stone and Steel" as part of our series FISCHER OBEN. In our first floor space we will show new works by the American artist Merrill Wagner (*1935).
Since the 1960s Merrill Wagner has explored the material properties of found objects as well as the interaction of color, line, shape and space.
In her new paintings Wager uses found steel plates, which she examines closely before combining them with other plates and applying monochrome paint. The structure of the plate’s surfaces determines how paint can be applied, how it runs and where it sticks, thus becoming essential to the overall character of the work. Using two ready-made elements – the found steel plates as well as rust preventive paint which the artist uses directly from the can – Wagner creates object-like paintings of great textural individuality. Their surfaces mirror the process of their making.
The floor works consist of natural materials such as stones and slates, which are altered by geometric drawings often seizing existing marks of the objects and continuing them on the floor or on the wall. Neither the origin nor the history of the stones are of importance to the artist. It is solely the structure of the surfaces which is of interest. Although modest in size, Wagner’s sculptures create a remarkable dynamic arising from the juxtaposition of organic shapes and geometric structures.
"The link between the stone works and the paintings on steel is that I spend a great deal of time and effort choosing the stones and then arranging them before I paint them. And the steel panels too, I have to look at them for a very long time in order to find the two that I want to put together. They are all very different from each other and it takes some thinking before I know which two will become one work – before I actually get to thinking about the paint.“ (Merrill Wagner)
Stone and Steel
8 March - 20 April 2013
Konrad Fischer Galerie Berlin is pleased to announce the exhibition "Stone and Steel" as part of our series FISCHER OBEN. In our first floor space we will show new works by the American artist Merrill Wagner (*1935).
Since the 1960s Merrill Wagner has explored the material properties of found objects as well as the interaction of color, line, shape and space.
In her new paintings Wager uses found steel plates, which she examines closely before combining them with other plates and applying monochrome paint. The structure of the plate’s surfaces determines how paint can be applied, how it runs and where it sticks, thus becoming essential to the overall character of the work. Using two ready-made elements – the found steel plates as well as rust preventive paint which the artist uses directly from the can – Wagner creates object-like paintings of great textural individuality. Their surfaces mirror the process of their making.
The floor works consist of natural materials such as stones and slates, which are altered by geometric drawings often seizing existing marks of the objects and continuing them on the floor or on the wall. Neither the origin nor the history of the stones are of importance to the artist. It is solely the structure of the surfaces which is of interest. Although modest in size, Wagner’s sculptures create a remarkable dynamic arising from the juxtaposition of organic shapes and geometric structures.
"The link between the stone works and the paintings on steel is that I spend a great deal of time and effort choosing the stones and then arranging them before I paint them. And the steel panels too, I have to look at them for a very long time in order to find the two that I want to put together. They are all very different from each other and it takes some thinking before I know which two will become one work – before I actually get to thinking about the paint.“ (Merrill Wagner)