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- Karin Gregorek was born on 26 September 1941 in Wendorf, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Germany. She was an actress, known for Bear Ye One Another's Burden (1988), Einer muß die Leiche sein (1978) and Ein Gespräch im Hause Stein über den abwesenden Herrn von Goethe (1979). She died on 22 April 2023 in Berlin, Germany.
- Art Director
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Uecker is the brother of the artist Rotraut and brother-in-law of the late artist Yves Klein. In 1949 he completed an apprenticeship as a painter and advertising designer. From 1949 to 1958 he studied painting at the University of Applied Arts in Wismar and then at the art academy in Berlin-Weißensee. In 1953 Uecker moved to Berlin. From 1955 to 1958 he was a student of Otto Pankok at the Düsseldorf Art Academy. In 1957, Uecker began to express his art with nails. He created his characteristic nail pictures, which he equipped with a white background. He arranged the nails in symmetrical formations on panels and boards. The nail reliefs achieve a dynamic effect through the directional arrangement of the nails and the interplay of light and shadow. Due to the white background, the nails create a dematerializing effect.
Uecker also carried out his nail work on other everyday objects such as furniture. During this time he made the acquaintance of Yves Klein, Heinz Mack and Otto Piene. Since 1957 he has shared exhibitions with the painter, sculptor and kinetic artist Otto Piene and the artist and light kineticist Heinz Mack. The exhibition objects include light boxes, rotating nail discs and light mills. In 1961 Uecker installed his first light plantation. In 1962 he was accepted into the artist group "Zero", which was officially founded in 1958 by Heinz Mack and Otto Piene. This developed into a decisive influence that led him to kinetic light art and prompted him to experiment with light modulations in the landscape. In 1965 Uecker made his first sand spiral. The following year he collaborated with Willoughby Sharp and opened a studio in New York.
Together with Gerhard Richter, Uecker staged the happening "Museums can be habitable places" in 1968, whereupon they also lived in the rooms of the Kunsthalle Baden-Baden themselves. Uecker staged a "terror orchestra" made up of vacuum cleaners, laundry drums, hammers and sickles. The exhibition of his personal area of life was an "example of the dissolution of existing museum practices". In 1971, he traveled through Latin America and studied Indian cultures. Between 1972 and 1974, Uecker traveled to Africa and Asia. In 1978 he took part in furnishing the Tonhalle in Düsseldorf. In 1984 and 1985 the artist traveled to Japan, Siberia, China, Mongolia and Iceland. In 1985, Uecker received a visiting professorship at the 32nd International Summer Academy for Fine Arts in Salzburg.
Two years later he spent four weeks at the Laboratorio Arte Contemporanea della Bassa Lunigiana, Castelnuovo. In 1991 he traveled to Israel. In 1993 and 1995, he traveled to Cambodia and studied Khmer culture as well as a stay and an exhibition in Japan. In the 1970s, Uecker turned to evironments. In 1970 he was the German representative at the Venice Biennale. In 1977, a wall relief was created for the UN building in Geneva. Some of the environments were designed to be kinetic, such as the work "Wiping Up" from 1988, which consisted of a rag attached to a rotating barrel and the movements left circles in the sand. His son Jacob was born from his marriage to his wife Christa in 1986.
His artistic repertoire also included designing stage sets, such as in 1979 in Bayreuth for the performance of "Lohengrin" or in 1982 in Stuttgart for the performance of "Tristan and Isolde". Uecker has been teaching at the Düsseldorf Art Academy since 1974. In 1976 he was appointed professor here. The artist was able to win numerous prizes and awards: in 1963 he won the first prize at the 4th San Marino Biennale for ZERO and Group N, in 1964 he received the Young Biennale in Paris prize and the sponsorship award from the state of North Rhine-Westphalia, and in 1971 he was awarded with He was awarded the Critics' Prize at the Biennale São Paulo, in 1983 he was presented with the Kaiserring of the city of Goslar, in 1985 he received the Federal Cross of Merit 1st Class of the Federal Republic of Germany and in 2000 he became a member of the Order Pour le mérite.
In 2002, Uecker exhibited at the Stuttgart Kunsthaus & Galerie Keim and at the Emdener Kunsthalle in Emden, Henri and Eske Nannen Foundation, Emden. His practical artistic work was accompanied by an extensive text. For his 75th birthday, a large exhibition of Uecker's works opened in Berlin's Martin-Gropius-Bau in March 2005. In 2006, Uecker received the B.Z. culture prize "Berliner Bär" and in 2010 he was awarded the Jan Wellem Ring by the state capital Düsseldorf. In 2015 he was honored with the State Prize of North Rhine-Westphalia. In the same year the "Mecklen State Library" was renamed in "Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania State Library Günther Uecker".