Isa Genzken, 2015. Courtesy Galerie Buchholz, Cologne/Berlin/New York. © VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2016
Isa Genzken

Isa Genzken, 2015. Courtesy Galerie Buchholz, Cologne/Berlin/New York. © VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2016

Isa Genzken

Born in 1948, in Bad Oldesloe (Germany)

 

For more than 30 years, Isa Genzken has been making multi-faceted work involving a wide variety of mediums and approaches, which have led her from sophisticated minimalist forms to a profusion of hybrid, "DIY" constructions.

The relationship with architecture and monuments plays a fundamental role in her work. Genzken began using computers very early in her career to create her first sculptures. In the 1980s she returned to working directly with materials, first plaster, then raw concrete, coloured translucent resin and mirror, creating streamlined forms that reference modernist architecture. As of 1997, her assemblage pieces, in part a fantastical interpretation of the urban and social context, have drawn on the pop quality of consumer products to highlight their forms and colours.

Selected Bibliography

Schafhausen, Nicolaus ; Müller, Vanessa Joan ; McDonough, Tom... [et al.]. I'm Isa Genzken, the only female fool : [Exhibition, Kunsthalle Wien, 28 May-7 September, 2014]. Berlin : Sternberg Press, 2014.

Breitwieser, Sabine ; Hoptman, Laura ; Darling, Michael... [et al.]. Isa Genzken : retrospective : [The Museum of Modern Art, New York, November 23, 2013- March 10, 2014 ; The Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, April 12-August 3, 2014 ; The Dallas Museum of Art, September 14, 2014-January 4, 2015]. New York : Museum of Modern Art, 2013.

König, Kasper ; Gülicher, Nina ; Tarsia, Andrea. Isa Genzken : open, sesame! : [exhibition, Whitechapel Gallery, London, 5 April-21 June 2009 ; Museum Ludwig, Cologne, 13 August-15 November 2009]. Cologne : Museum Ludwig ; London : Whitechapel Gallery : Koenig, 2009.

Schafhausen, Nicolaus. Isa Genzken : oil : german pavilion : Venice biennale 2007. Köln : Dumont, 2007.

Farquharson, Alex ; Diederichsen, Diedrich ; Breitwieser, Sabine. Isa Genzken. London ; New York : Phaidon, 2006. (Contemporary artists). 

***   All materials available at the Documentation Centre of the Fondation  ***

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