Meuser, Doris Tsangaris
21 Jan - 21 Feb 2015
© Doris Tsangaris
Untitled, 2009
acrylic on paper
80 x 230 cm
each 26 x 20 cm
Untitled, 2009
acrylic on paper
80 x 230 cm
each 26 x 20 cm
© Meuser
Badewanne, schwerer Einstig für die Oma, 2015
steel, paint
89 x 140 x 62 cm
Badewanne, schwerer Einstig für die Oma, 2015
steel, paint
89 x 140 x 62 cm
MEUSER, DORIS TSANGARIS
Drei Serien, Drei Skulpturen
22 January - 21 February 2015
curated by Cornelius Tittel
There has been a great deal written about outsider art in recent years. Berlin’s Hamburger Bahnhof dedicated an entire series of exhibitions to the subject, while Massimiliano Gioni reserved a significant part of the Venice Biennale for outsider art. German artist Doris Tsangaris, born in 1957, would have a lot to say about outsider art, having worked now for many years in a studio in Benninghof, one of the largest and oldest institutions for the mentally handicapped in North Rhine-Westphalia. She paints with the residents here twice a week, and has the studio to herself the rest of the time. And yet, the drawing instructor herself is also an outsider artist par excellence. Entirely outside the official art world, she has created an immense and nonetheless precise oeuvre over the last three decades, always working in series, always on paper, usually the cheapest she could find. Three decades in which she created ever larger work series in dialogue with artists such as Richard Tuttle, Raoul de Keyser, Al Taylor, or Günther Förg, without ever having met any of these like minds. Three decades in which she repeatedly burned entire series of drawings. Room was limited in her cabinets and boxes: and, after all, who would ever want to see all of these works?
In her first Berlin exhibition, indeed, her first ever show in a commercial gallery, three series by Doris Tsangaris encounter three new sculptures by Meuser, the insider artist par excellence and the teacher of several famous students.
If Doris Tsangaris had not begun raising her four children in the 1980s, considering her art as something private, practiced outside the system, their paths would surely have crossed at an earlier date. “Three Series, Three Sculptures,” brings together two generational colleagues, two artists from the Ruhr region. One coming out, the other coming home.
Cornelius Tittel
Drei Serien, Drei Skulpturen
22 January - 21 February 2015
curated by Cornelius Tittel
There has been a great deal written about outsider art in recent years. Berlin’s Hamburger Bahnhof dedicated an entire series of exhibitions to the subject, while Massimiliano Gioni reserved a significant part of the Venice Biennale for outsider art. German artist Doris Tsangaris, born in 1957, would have a lot to say about outsider art, having worked now for many years in a studio in Benninghof, one of the largest and oldest institutions for the mentally handicapped in North Rhine-Westphalia. She paints with the residents here twice a week, and has the studio to herself the rest of the time. And yet, the drawing instructor herself is also an outsider artist par excellence. Entirely outside the official art world, she has created an immense and nonetheless precise oeuvre over the last three decades, always working in series, always on paper, usually the cheapest she could find. Three decades in which she created ever larger work series in dialogue with artists such as Richard Tuttle, Raoul de Keyser, Al Taylor, or Günther Förg, without ever having met any of these like minds. Three decades in which she repeatedly burned entire series of drawings. Room was limited in her cabinets and boxes: and, after all, who would ever want to see all of these works?
In her first Berlin exhibition, indeed, her first ever show in a commercial gallery, three series by Doris Tsangaris encounter three new sculptures by Meuser, the insider artist par excellence and the teacher of several famous students.
If Doris Tsangaris had not begun raising her four children in the 1980s, considering her art as something private, practiced outside the system, their paths would surely have crossed at an earlier date. “Three Series, Three Sculptures,” brings together two generational colleagues, two artists from the Ruhr region. One coming out, the other coming home.
Cornelius Tittel