Zeitgenössische Kunst * Köln Contemporary Art * Cologne

John Dillemuth, Felix Gephart, Mu Pan, Hagen Rehborn, Daniel Ruanova, Betti Scholz "Silly Season 2010" / Retrospect & Preview July 22 - August 29, 2010 Exhibition Views Deutsche Version

KunstRaum H&H continues its yearly exhibition series "Silly Season" and plans the present show 2010 again as a Retrospect and Preview of the gallery program. Six artists are represented with paintings, drawings and assemblages. Hagen Rehborn, Daniel Ruanova and Betti Scholz show paintings of medium and bigger sizes. In retrospect we will be presenting selected works from past shows as well as new works with an exciting prospect. With John Dillemuth's sculptural assemblage "Love Machine" we show an interactive work full of humor and scurrility. In addition there are some of the umbrella-assemblages from his past solo show. Felix Gephart and Mu Pan represent the genre drawing. We are glad to show these very expressive artists together in this group exhibition. It was Felix Gephart who drew our attention to his former fellow student at the School of Visual Arts in New York; we are very pleased to welcome Mu Pan as a new gallery artist. OF MEN AND APES EXHIBITION - KunstRaum H&H presents their artists by Jürgen Kisters (Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger, August 7/8, 2010) Checking out the "Love Machine" by John Dillemuth: the gallery owners Petra Hewel-Herrmann and Jens Herrmann in their art space. (Image: Bause) Many gallery owners use the summer season to present their program in group shows. This may sound little spectacular, but it can in fact be quite exciting; especially when the artistic program is of such a great variety as at KunstRaum H&H. The artists, with whom the gallery owners Petra Hewel-Herrmann und Jens Herrmann cooperate at their art space, founded a year ago in the old city of Cologne, come from different countries. The brilliant draftsman and painter Mu Wen Pan originates in Taiwan and now lives in Brooklyn, New York. In his portrayal of men, which are accurate in every detail, he masterly succeeds in witty-critical aggravations regarding the subject matters of power and violence in the Chinese history and today's society. The motif of a whisky boozing worrier and a general on a motor cycle with a sidecar reminds of the socio-critical drawings by German artists in the 1920's. The works by Berlin based Felix Gephart also stand in the tradition of graphic mastery, which combines an anatomically exact depiction of reality with elements of pointed emphasis. In the physical existence of men as his central theme questions regarding morals are his subject matter. His compositions developed by uncountable fine strokes are constantly immersed in the dimension of the scary and the terrifying. The people reduced to vague schemes on a group painting by Berlin painter Betti Scholz on the other hand almost seem soothing. Also the monstrous oddity of Hagen Rehborn's ape portrays in no way appear disturbing but rather like a surprising reflection of the unnormal normality in the present being human. At least since the evolution theory of Charles Darwin the human-all too human was expressed in painting again and again in a cheerful manner using the motif of the ape. The contemporary version of the Cologne artist shows men as androgynous human-animalic composite creatures with an ape's face characterized by failure. By far more bewildering are the paintings of large format by Daniel Ruanova painted with power, restlessness and resoluteness. The artist who lives in the Mexican Tijuana lets the colors and forms explode in all directions, while at the same time he braces himself against the pictorial chaos. Fierceness and concept, complexity and the desire for order put up a hard and patient struggle in his paintings and convey to the observer the perception that in the visual arts above all it is not just the crafty idea that matters but rather the visible struggle of its realization. The sculptures by the US American John Dillemuth could however prove just the opposite. Between the poles of jest, satire, irony and deeper meaning the San Diego based artist constructs with lambent ease from underwear and branches "toys" for adults. His "Love Machine" is a rack which allows two people facing each other move towards or away from each other while the pantyhose shrinks or is stretched like an elastic band. As is well known exhibition visitors love art works that touch sensuously and especially those that can even be touched physically. Kunstraum H&H , Buttermarkt 17-19, Mo-Fr 1-7 pm, Sa 12-4 pm, till August 29, 2010 Translation by KunstRaum H&H

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