ANNETTE KELM

In her work, Annnette Kelm is interested in the function of objects and the nature of their representation, typologies, mass production, design, and technology. Her photographs often conflate several genres into single images, or develop single motifs across serial images to combine a variety of artistic, historical, and cross-cultural references. Annette Kelm’s work will be the subject of forthcoming exhibitions at the Kunsthalle Vienna, Vienna in 2019, and the Ludwig Foundation, Aachen, Germany in 2018. Past solo exhibitions of Kelm’s work include Annette Kelm: Leaves, Kestnergesellschaft, Hannover, Germany, 2017, Detroit City/Detroit Affinities: Annette Kelm, Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit, Detroit, 2016, Dust, Kölnischer Kunstverein, Cologne, Germany, 2014, Annette Kelm, Kunsthalle Zürich, Zürich, 2009, KW – Institute for Contemporary Art, Berlin, 2009, CCA Wattis, Institute for Contemporary Art, San Francisco, 2008 and Witte de With, Rotterdam, Netherlands, 2008. In 2013, Kelm participated in New Photography, at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, and in 2011, participated in ILLUMInations, curated by Bice Curiger, the 54th International Exhibition at the Venice Biennale, Venice. Her work is held in the permanent collections of institutions including Tate Modern, London, the Museum of Modern Art, New York, Centre Pompidou, Paris, Guggenheim Museum, New York, Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, the Hessel Museum of Art, Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, NY, Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas, Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, and Kunsthaus Zürich, among others.

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Tomato Target

December 14, 2018 - March 24, 2019

The exhibition at Kunsthalle Wien turns the spotlight on works in which architecture, design, or constellations of seemingly mundane objects are revealed to be visual manifestations of complex genealogies. The Versuchsanstalt für Wasserbau und Schiffsbau in Berlin, an iconic building that houses facilities for experiments in fluid mechanics and ship engineering, appears in Kelm’s photograph as an abstract architectonic volume of color. In the series Friendly Tournament, the shooting targets pitted with holes and small craters where they were struck by arrows recall Lucio Fontana’s perforated canvases and offer an analysis of the interrelation between figure and ground, between three-dimensional reality and its representation, that is both intellectually astute and laconic. Yet here, too, something inscrutable remains.

Germany is not an island (group show)

March 8 - May 27, 2018

"Germany is not an island" - this quote is not consciously assigned to anybody, but was and is used by different personalities in different contexts. It is clear, however, that the exhibition is intended to describe the multicultural location 'Germany', a place where everyone is welcome. And a place where all the arts can develop interdisciplinary. Art often seeks the confrontation with traditional perspectives and ideas and thus opens up spaces that also call for greater tolerance, openness and reflection. It needs no social consensus, no vote, but is first and foremost free. Politically, however, she is still, and socially-promoting power also resides in her, especially when she invokes her freedom and her obstinacy.

Fictive Kin (group show)

February 24 - May 6, 2018

Fictive kinships mimic familial relationships but are ultimately defined on their own terms. Fictive Kin presents works by three contemporary artists who all construct photographic tableaux, and are united by their cultivation of modes of seeing that question conventions behind the photographic representation of three-dimensional objects. Sarah Conaway, Annette Kelm, and Kim Schoen harness the visual language of commercial art and advertising. At its most effective, advertising renders the photograph a signifier that we subconsciously identify as assuming an authoritative voice. It serves a clear purpose and delivers an inscrutable message. In the work of these artists, similar strategies are used to subversive, absurd, and philosophical ends. They communicate the arbitrariness of inherited conventions, solicit humor, and render anew the vernacular visual environment that so engulfs us that we may be unaware of it.

ANNETTE KELM

Biography

ANNETTE KELM AT KUNSTHALLE WIEN