KölnSkulptur #10
ÜberNatur – Natural Takeover
Skulpturenpark Köln, Cologne
August 1, 2020–July 31, 2022
www.skulpturenparkkoeln.de
ÜberNatur – Natural Takeover, the 10th biannual KölnSkulptur exhibition of contemporary outdoor sculpture, addresses notions of "nature" and the complex ways it is represented and examined, domesticated and despoiled. Inspired by the location of the public park, wedged between the Rhine, the Cologne Zoo, the Flora and the adjacent Botanical Garden, this latest iteration of KölnSkulptur includes eight new artworks in the Skulpturenpark Köln, a unique exhibition venue featuring loaned works from past KölnSkulptur exhibitions, interspersed amongst the permanent collection amassed by Michael and Eleonore Stoffel. These eight new works disrupt and destabilise ideas of "nature" through interventions and core concerns that decenter the primacy of the human and open up vistas of communal ecology and care.
KölnSkulptur #10 opens amid a devastating global pandemic, triggered by the rare spillover of a virus from wild animals to humans. Facilitated by ever-closer connections between disparate parts of the world as a result of globalisation, the virus has rampaged like wildfire, infecting millions of people. The "new normal" engendered by this global pandemic brings with it a sense of temporality and progress in hiatus or even in "retreat", causing us to contemplate the world from novel perspectives. Art and art exhibitions are, of course, not exempt from such new interrogations. An awareness of the devastating impact that increased globalisation and its harnessing of endless economic growth through rapidly permeating worldwide networks has on our natural and human environment is now of utmost urgency. At the same time, we must not forget the visionary power of art and its ability to forge new ideas and sense-forms—not to mention its ability to refer to the ineffable beyond the relentless logic of utility and human efficiency.
Curator: Tobias Berger
Assistant curator: Anna Czerlitzki
For more information, please visit www.skulpturenparkkoeln.de.