Exhibition // Hanne Darboven and Charlotte Posenenske at Konrad Fischer Galerie

Article by Lisa Birch in Berlin // Saturday, Jan. 28, 2017

Konrad Fischer Galerie will be celebrating its 50th anniversary in 2017, by holding a series of exhibitions that reflect the development of its presence and historical relevance as a gallery. The anniversary kicks off in Berlin and takes us back to the gallery’s formative years by representing some of its first exhibited artists and showing the development of their work. Konrad Fischer will be presenting the work of Hanne Darboven and Charlotte Posenenske, both of whom participated in the second ever exhibition held by the gallery.

Darboven originally occupied the gallery walls in 1967 with her ‘Konstruktionen’ project, consisting of 120 drawings. This time around the gallery will be exhibiting two completed bodies of her work in their entirety. ‘Wunschkonzert’ (1984) was influenced by a German radio show on the NDR channel, which invited listeners to dedicate a piece of music in honor of a loved one, every Sunday. This project is comprised of 1009 pages, divided into 4 parts; ‘Opus 17A und B’ and ‘Opus 18A und B’. Each Opus contains 36 poems, constructed vertically in rows of 7 and includes a title page collaged with a confirmation on greetings card. She created a calculation system for presenting her work in the late 60s and this is seen yet again in her second piece. ’42/100 Ein Jahrhundert ABC’, created in 2002, encompasses 72 panels, arranged in three parts and consists of various graphical representations showing the timeline of the 20th century.

Posenenske’s ‘Square Tubes Series DW’, was an installation made of corrugated cardboard and serves primarily as an industrial product rather than artwork. The objective was to create work that was light, cheap and economically sensible. Her precursory work ‘Series D’, a construction kit of 6 different elements in galvanized sheet steel, was also arranged in this simple and rational manner. After the death of Charlotte Posenenske in 1985, both Series D and DW have been shown in various locations including Frankurt, Paris, Tokyo and New York. Thanks to the support of her husband Burkhard Brunn and Galerie Mehdi Chouakri, the work made its way back to Berlin and is presented once more by the Konrad Fischer gallery.