Storefront for Art and Architecture is pleased to announce an exhibition by Berlin-based artist Manfred Pernice.

 

Small Works, 1994-2004 presents a selection of over thirty small-scale works displayed inside three vessel-like vitrines which the artist created for the exhibition at Storefront. Made of cardboard and other found materials, the works resemble architectural models and are both referential and purely formal; precise and raw.

 

Small Works, 1994-2004 marks the first time that these pieces have been shown together and offers a new entry point into the work Pernice has produced over the last ten years. The collection of models demonstrates both the extreme spectrum of scale in which he operates and the varying degrees of influence that existing urban structures have on his work. Some of the pieces on display have served as studies for large-scale installations such as ESTREL (2002) and 1a – Dosenfeld’00 (2000), while others exist as independent works. Here the distinction between sculpture, model, and architecture is blurred. However, it is not architecture per se that interests Pernice, but the narratives located in the built environment. Pernice’s work distorts the perception of space by using the architectural model as a fictional rendering of material reality, or at least a possible reality. Pernice reads landscapes and translates their formal, social, and political meanings into his own psycho-sculptural-architectural language.

 

Manfred Pernice has recently exhibited his work as part of Documenta II, the 50th Venice Biennale, and at Mass MoCA. His sculpture, Sieg (2001) is currently on view in Sitings: Installation Art 1969-2002, at MOCA-LA’s Geffen Contemporary. Pernice has had solo shows at Witte de With in Rotterdam, Portikus in Frankfurt, Hamburger Bahnhof in Berlin, Sprengel Museum in Hanover, and the Kunsthalle Zurich. A catalog of his work, Die Dritte Dimension, was published by Portikus with Walther Konig, in 2002.

Work for the exhibition was lent by Galerie NEU, Berlin; Anton Kern Gallery, New York; Private Collection Schroder, Hamburg; Private Collection, Berlin; and Private Collection, Bremerhaven.

 

Small Works, 1994-2004 was organized in conjunction with the exhibition:
Manfred Pernice
COMMERZBANK
Anton Kern Gallery
532 West 20th Street
New York, NY 10011
February 21-March 20, 2004