Gereon Krebber

FAQs

How do you assemble your shows?

How do you assemble your shows?

Rooms can be very hard nuts to crack—for instance, the side gallery at the Lehmbruck Museum. A forty-meter-long tube; the side that faces the street is a long row of windows, the other side is a dark brick wall. A theatrical setting for the museum, difficult to deal with. There was no budget for my project there, but there was a stipend, and the director asked me to simply show what I had made in the studio. But I always think about the viewer when planning my shows: what kind of experience am I inviting visitors to have? What can I possibly do with my work here, specifically? Frequently, I start out right away with the entrance, and block any open access. I developed and built works specifically for the Lehmbruck Museum: a bluish, shimmering wall-snake, seconded by a connecting piece and a conduit made of insulation foam.
In some exhibitions, I show just one work, which has to cut to the chase. For shows like the one in Drogheda, I assembled a tour of various works, sort of like a sculptural obstacle course. Here, I let the various materials, formats, forms, and surfaces collide, as you do in a collage. Small next to big, smooth next to crumpled, a hole next to a mural, a blockade in front of a mobile—spaces are narrowed, things strewn about and constricted, objects balancing each other out, or emphasized. I prefer to avoid all too obvious references, or predetermined themes and settings like the overpowering altar. Mostly, I ignore those things. References are too easily illustrative, which is stifling, and makes it harder to actively perceive and decode.

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