Hauser and Wirth New York will kick-off the New Year with Günther Förg. Works from 1986 – 2007 opening in Chelsea and Luchita Hurtado. Dark Years to open on the Upper East Side in January.
Beginning 24 January, Hauser & Wirth will present its first exhibition devoted to Günther Förg since announcing representation of the artist’s estate in June 2018, with the exhibition Günther Förg: Works from 1986-2007. Born in Füssen, Germany, Förg was a prolific painter, sculptor, graphic designer, and photographer whose daring conceptual works incorporate and critique tropes of Modernism. Throughout his life, Förg tirelessly engaged the intellectual context in which 20th century evolved, creating deft and witty responses to the Minimalism of Kazimir Malevich, the figuration of Paul Klee, the formal abstraction of Blinky Palermo, and the Expressionism of Clyfford Still and Mark Rothko, among others. In so doing, he left behind an oeuvre that defies easy categorization. In this exhibition, featured works will range from Förg’s wall drawings to his conceptual photography, sculpture and paintings, spanning his multidisciplinary career, which unfolded as a series of ambitious, sustained investigations into new materials and philosophies.
For more than seventy years, Luchita Hurtado has explored connections between the body and its larger context – nature, the environment, the cosmos – in an effort to express universality and transcendence. In her work, abstraction and figuration merge to mystical effect. Her multicultural life and career are reflected in the eclectic mediums and formal techniques of her oeuvre. Born in Caracas, Venezuela, in 1920, Hurtado immigrated to New York in 1928 and later lived in Mexico, the American Southwest, and Northern California. ‘Dark Years’ focuses on the artist’s early works from the 1940s to the 1950s, a period defined by prolific experimentation. The paintings and drawings on view range stylistically from surrealist figuration and geometric patterning, to biomorphic forms executed with expressive acuity. Assembled, they illuminate the emergence of a remarkable visual language and underscore the significance of Hurtado’s unique artistic contributions. ‘Dark Years,’ Hurtado’s first solo exhibition with Hauser & Wirth, will be followed in May 2019 by her first solo institutional exhibition at the Serpentine Sackler Gallery, London.
Günther Förg: Works from 1986 – 2007 will be on view from January 24 to April 6, 2019 at Hauser & Wirth New York, 548 West 22nd Street, NYC.
Luchita Hurtado: Dark Years will be on view from January 31 to April 6, 2019 at Hauser & Wirth, 32 East 69th Street, NYC.