
WOLFGANG LAIB | Passageway | Solo show | Villa Panza, Varese | opening 26 October 2023
- Villa Panza
- Piazza Litta, 1, 21100 Varese VA
- 26 ottobre 2023
Wolfgang Laib (b. Metzingen, Germany, 1950), lives and works between southern Germany, southern India, and New York. After studying medicine at the University of Tübingen, he devoted himself to art practice by creating sculptures and installations that seem to link past and present, the ephemeral and the eternal, using simple but highly symbolic organic materials usually associated with sustenance, such as pollen, milk, beeswax and rice.
His work has been presented at Documenta (1982, 1987) and the Venice Biennale (1997, 1999, 2019), while his first major institutional exhibition was held at the Musée d'art moderne de la ville de Paris (1986). He has subsequently been featured in numerous solo exhibitions, notably at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden in Washington (2002), the Dallas Museum of Art (2002), Haus der Kunst in Munich (2002-03), Fondation Beyeler in Basel (2005-06), Fondazione Merz in Turin (2009), and MMK Museum für Moderne Kunst in Frankfurt (2010).
His largest pollen work was installed in the atrium of MoMA New York in 2013. In the same year, the artist's first permanent installation, a beeswax room, opened at the Phillips Collection in Washington, DC, and in 2014, he created a 40m-long permanent underground beeswax chamber in Anselm Kiefer's La Ribaute studio in Barjac.
In 2015 he received the Praemium Imperiale in Tokyo.
In Florence, Italy, in 2019, the Museo del 900 presented his work at several historical sites: Convent of San Marco , Magi Chapel in Palazzo Medici Riccardi, Pazzi Chapel in Santa Crace and at the Rucellai Sepulchre in San Pancrazio.
In 2023, the Kunstmuseum Stuttgart dedicated a solo exhibition to his work and presented the documentary "Wolfgang Laib: Here, Now and Far Beyond."
In this exhibition developed in collaboration with Wolfgang Laib, the Kunstmuseum Stuttgart is presenting pieces from the most important work complexes in each of the artist’s creative phases. On view are, for instance, “Rice Houses” and “Ziggurats,” a selection of drawings, as well as a pollen field. The exhibition also
Ever since his journeys to India as a young man the idea inspired him to see humans as part of a largerwhole. He also follows this way of life in his art. Thereby the artist tracks down the universal, the eternal and works with natural materials such as pollen, rice,
Lia Rumma Gallery will be exhibiting at Art Basel from September 20 to 26. You can find us at booth A1 | hall 2.0 and in Unlimited with “Rosa delicata” by Ettore Spalletti – booth U7 | hall 1.0
On the occasion of ArtBasel OVR: Pioneers, LiaRumma Gallery is pleased to present a selection of works by artists who over the years have proven to be absolute trailblazers in their respective fields. Marina Abramovic, Vanessa Beecroft, William Kentridge, Joseph Kosuth, Ugo Mulas, Haim Steinbach, Gilberto Zorio are just a