The Pinakothek der Moderne is staging the American artist’s first retrospective. The focus is being placed on Zoe Leonard’s photographic work of the past twenty years, their subtle, visual look at the relationship between the sexes, the ambivalence between culture and nature, history and the present day, as well as the relation between space and time. Leonard, born in 1961 in Liberty, New York, is one of the most exceptional artists of her generation. Among other venues, her works were shown at the documenta in 1992 and 2007. On view through 5 July, 2009.
For more than twenty years her photographs have reflected her wanderings – lost in thought – and her cognitive way of looking at things. Leonard’s unconventional views of water or with mirrors, her images of female anatomical wax figures, of fashion shows, of trees and fencing, her hunting trophies from various cities and countries are not intended as pictorial inventions but show the precision and attentive manner in which she finds, captures and memorises her subjects. Seemingly everyday things photographed in black and white or in colour will be shown in a new context. The artist wants to render her lost history visible again, to give it a voice of its own while, at the same time, wresting it from its transient state.
This, the first and only restrospective of Leonard’s work in Germany, has been initiated by the Fotomuseum Winterthur and comprises some 90 works. The 600 square metres exhibition space will be re-designed by the artist herself especially for the Pinakothek der Moderne.
Designed by the German Architect Stephan Braunfels, the Pinakothek der Moderne was inaugurated in September 2002 after seven years of construction. The rectilinear facade, dominated by white and grey concrete, is interrupted by large windows and highrising columns, the latter supporting the extensive canopied roof. Each of the four corners of the building, connected by a central rotunda, is dedicated to a special collection. The Museum is thus divided into Art (Kunst), Architecture (Architektur), Design (Design) and Works on Paper (Graphik).
The museum also gives very profound insights into international contemporary art. In the first floor of the east wing the gallery displays works of Lucio Fontana, Alberto Burri, Jannis Kounellis, Andy Warhol, Jasper Johns, Robert Rauschenberg, Robert Motherwell, Franz Kline, Antoni Tàpies, Cy Twombly, Willem de Kooning, George Segal, Richard Serra, Dan Flavin, Donald Judd, Fred Sandback, Joseph Beuys, Blinky Palermo, Henry Moore, Marino Marini, Per Kirkeby, Georg Baselitz, Gerhard Richter, Sigmar Polke, Bruce Nauman, Marlene Dumas, Günther Förg, Jörg Immendorff, Mike Kelley, Martin Kippenberger, David Salle, Rosemarie Trockel, David Hockney, Hermann Nitsch and many others.
www.pinakothek.de/pinakothek-der-moderne/englisch/englisch.htm
