IGNACIO URIARTE
WORK ON PAPER

For Munich Re's new office building in Berliner Strasse, Berlin artist Ignacio Uriarte created an ensemble of seven individual works. Architects Sauerbruch Hutton designed a courtyard encircled by a gallery, in which alternating exhibitions of contemporary art will be shown.

Within the framework of the cooperation between Munich Re and the Städtische Galerie im Lenbachhaus, Matthias Mühling, Director of Lenbachhaus, curated the first presentation.

Ignacio Uriarte speaking with Susanne Ehrenfried-Bergmann and Matthias Mühling, Director of the Städtische Galerie im Lenbachhaus and curator of the exhibition.

In his art, Ignacio Uriarte occupies himself with the topic of everyday work, also using materials and objects for the artworks that can be found in any office. In doing so, he turns his sketches, installations and paper pieces into poetic documents that grapple with the issues of time, structure, order and monotony, and creative potential in seemingly inefficient moments, for example when doodling on a writing pad during a conversation. With his conceptual approach, and by using materials from ordinary office surroundings, the artist builds an impressive bridge between the working and the artistic world.

Seven of his works can be seen in four sections of the gallery. Delicate structures with a fine marbling effect alternate with angular geometric patterns, lending the wall segments a new surface impression. What at first glance appears to be plaster, putty and paint applied to the walls over a large surface, turns out on closer inspection to be "run-of-the-mill" copy paper. The folding, tearing or crumpling of the smooth paper gives it a relief-like surface that light plays on to create art in space.

Simultaneous to this exhibition, one of the artist's installations can also be experienced in the exhibition rooms at the Lenbachhaus, an expression there as well of the collaboration between Munich Re and the museum.