Michael Morgner: Reliquie Mensch

People are at the centre of Michael Morgner's works. Stylised into striking ciphers, his human images unfold a power between rebellion and sinking in, the fateful being thrown into the world and the urge to escape from it. The Chemnitz version of the steel sculpture, which Morgner has realised in several versions, is based on a rectangular, rust-red corroded steel plate resting on a low concrete plinth. Lines, webs and bundles were cut out with a laser and erected vertically as a silhouette. Rust and rainwater collect in the negative form of the base plate and reflect the sky above the sculpture depending on the incidence of light, weather and time of day. Morgner's human figure appears here as a figure of fear, simultaneously straightening and bending, travelling along the lines, paths and twists and turns that life draws.

Born in Einsiedel near Chemnitz in 1942, the draughtsman, printmaker, painter, steel sculptor and performance artist moved to Karl-Marx-Stadt (Chemnitz) as a freelance artist in 1966 after studying at the Academy of Visual Arts in Leipzig, where he still lives and works today. Together with Dagmar Ranft-Schinke, Carlfriedrich Claus, Thomas Ranft and Gregor-Torsten Kozik (born as Schade), Morgner founded the artist group "Clara Mosch" in 1977, which was joined by a producer gallery. According to Morgner, the group tried to make "some kind of art that didn't look like the GDR". With their exhibitions, happenings and land art actions, the "Moschists" were targeted by the GDR state security, which put an end to the group's activities in 1982.

Since the mid-1980s, Morgner has focussed on the technique of etching and has varied archetypal human figures and symbols, which the artist also translated into steel sculptures from 1995 onwards. As counter-designs to the colourful consumer society, they quote eternally valid archetypes of human life, suffering and death.

(Text: Ulrike Pennewitz / Alexander Ochs)