"Not knowing is a good state of art" (Deacon)
A native of Wales, artist Richard Deacon (born 1949) is considered one of the leading representatives of contemporary sculpture. Early on he became recognized as a designer of unusual shapes and a creator of an artistic world relating to the mobility of organic life.
The exhibition at the Sprengel Museum Hannover was developed in close collaboration with Richard Deacon and is the first retrospective of over 40 creative years of the artist. On display are 40 sculptures and 60 drawings, prints and photographs.
In the early 1980s, Richard Deacon made himself known in the new English sculptor scene as one of those artists who seek direct confrontation with the material. Deacon works with materials as diverse as ceramics, metal, wood, paper, resin, plastic, glass, leather and fabric. He defines himself as a "fabricator”. His sculptures hide none of their technical development processes and bear the marks of assembly, riveting, twisting, stretching, folding or binding.
In addition to some 30 monumental sculptures for sites in urban areas and landscapes, Richard Deacon created many medium-sized sculptures that take the human body or the artist's studio as a benchmark, as well as small-scale works. The appearance of Deacon’s biomorphic shapes suggests a kinship with the work of Jean Arp. Although some of his sculptures build on the register of organic life, they are of very minimalistic and materialistic severity.
The mobile, flowing lines create the impression of an unstable choreography full of mystery and metamorphosis, which are also reflected in the poetic titles of his works. In this way, the viewer is given an idea of the complexity of the world and the relativity of knowledge and perception. "Not knowing is a good state of art", commented Deacon.
The title that Richard Deacon has chosen for this retrospective, The Missing Part, refers to a fundamental aspect of his work - the constructive role of the void, cave or space, which is at the center of his sculptural approach and inscribed in the great tradition of modern sculpture.
The exhibition catalog is published by Walther König, 272 pages with numerous illustrations. German edition: ISBN 978-3-86560-757-7
23 January until 15 May 2011
Sprengel Museum Hannover, Kurt-Schwitters-Platz, 30169 Hannover
