Woodcuts Thomas Schütte

• Nine large-format colour woodcuts of overwhelming chromatic and tactile presence • Architecture as a three-dimensional conceptual model, a medium for social criticism and political commentary • One copy of the ‘Woodcuts’ is held in the collection of MoMA, New York; K 21 in Düsseldorf is currently showing the comprehensive retrospective ‘Thomas Schütte’ The ‘Woodcuts’ hold particular significance within Thomas Schütte’s oeuvre. With their monumental scale, these large-format colour woodcuts address a central concern of the artist. Schütte understands architecture not merely as the practical engineering of real buildings, but as an extended form of sculpture, a three-dimensional conceptual model, and a medium for social criticism and political commentary. For over 30 years, alongside his internationally renowned sculptural work, Thomas Schütte has been exploring the theme of building in public spaces. He critically engages with prevailing trends in architecture, the redundant formal language and materiality of details, through small-scale and meticulously crafted models. He explores archetypes of public buildings or develops ingenious dwellings for the individual. His models are often a bitter commentary on our times, artistically and politically provocative. Whether he elevates his wooden models to the status of sculptures by placing them on plinths or realises them on a 1:1 scale to make them accessible to the public, Thomas Schütte thereby sharpens our perception. A one-man holiday home or his design for a sculpture hall in which his own work is to be exhibited – for Schütte, these architectural works are socio-political models for participation and dignity. By satirising state and cultural architecture or exposing it in its sterile form, he critiques political and bureaucratic systems. All these ideas underpin the exaggerated scale of the motifs in the ‘Woodcuts’. Vividly coloured and enhanced by the rich surface texture of the woodcut blocks, architecture is presented here in a modular and exemplary manner: a fireplace, a portal, a staircase, a Romanesque double window. Modular elements with which to conceive a fantastical castle that demonstrates power, yet could just as easily be a prison. | 1954 Oldenburg | Zeitgenössische Kunst | Druckgrafik | Nummer: 100042 | Provenance: Peter Freeman, Inc., New York; Sammlung Olbricht, Nordrhein-Westfalen, 2013 bei Vorgenannter erworben.

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