Anselm Reyle
Born in 1970, in Tübingen, Germany
Lives and works in Berlin, Germany
Anselm Reyle is an artist that deals with both abstraction and formalism. Reyle is one of the few contemporary German painters who examine the lessons of abstraction and their place in contemporary painting at a moment when a figurative painting has gained critical momentum. His critique of painting extends to his exploration of the constantly shifting criteria required for a work to be considered complete.
The artist’s stripe paintings are instantly recognizable as responses to the formalist vocabulary of Clement Greenburg that defined the art of the 1950s and 1960s. Reyle references iconic abstractionists ranging from Kennet Noland to Otto Freundlich. His “objets-trouves” are a reference to his multi-media installations that include sculpture and found neon lights, are in constant dialogue about the role of modernism today.
Reyle often uses materials that are found objects, such as acrylic, mirrors, PVC-foil or concrete and each composition can be made in any number of sizes ranging in scale from the personal to the monument.
He often uses a sculptural motif in both his sculptures and paintings that has become a modernist art cliché but reworks it in order to invest it with new meaning and context. Characteristic of his work are various found objects that have been removed from their original function, altered visually and recontextualized.
The artist works with colours that not only are completely alien to each other in nature, but no artist would dare think of them as part of his colour palate. Reyle is more fascinated by urbane, psychedelic neon colours than he would be with natural colours. “I live in a city, and I’m fascinated by neon colours more than the natural ones,” he says, adding, “I think it’s boring to start with colours that complete each other. I think it’s more challenging to begin with disharmony and then arrive at harmony. Even I didn’t like these colours when I started working, but I have grown fond of them. For me what’s beautiful and what’s not changes all the time,” he says.
CV
Graduated from the Karlsruhe Academy of Fine Arts, Karlsruhe, Germany, 1998.
Reyle's work has been presented in numerous solo and group exhibitions, including the Migros Museum in Zurich, the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles and the second edition of the Prague Biennale in 2002. His first solo exhibition was in 1999 in Berlin, other venues for solo exhibitions include The Modern Institute in Glasgow, Galerie Almine Rech in Paris, Gavin Brown's enterprise in New York, and The Tate Modern in London. In 2012 he received the ARKEN Art Prize
SELECTED COLLECTIONS
Daimler Contemporary, Berlin Sammlung Boros, Berlin, CCA Andratx, Andratx , The Saatchi Gallery, London
Rubell Family Collection, Miami, FL
Anselm Reyle, Untitled, 2012 , mixed media on canvas, wooden frame framed , 86 x 63 x 5,5 cm | 33.86 x 24.8 x 2.17 in , # REYL0001