Rebecca Horn
- Year of birth, place
- 1944, Michelstadt, Germany
- Role at the ZKM
- in the collection
- Biography
- Rebecca Horn was born in Michelstadt im Odenwald, Hessen in 1944 and studied (1964-69) at the Hochschule für bildende Künste, Hamburg. Since 1989 she has taught at the Hochschule für Bildende Künste, Berlin. Her work has been honoured with many prizes and awards, among them the documenta prize (1986), the Karlsruhe Medienkunstpreis (1992) and the Kaiserring bestowed by the city of Goslar (1992). She now lives in Bad Königszell, Berlin and New York.
Starting from her work as a sculptor and performance artist, Rebecca Horn has also been active as a filmmaker and as an installation artist. During the late 1960s she produced sculpture largely using soft materials such as feathers or cloth, to resemble prosthesis-like objects and masks that emphasized particular extremities of the bodies on which they were worn. These works are featured in Horn's performance art, some of which has been adapted into films. The human body and its relation to space are central to Horn's interests. Rapidly, Horn's objects have achieved a sort of independence and have effectively become kinetic sculptures, albeit appearing still to depend on underlying human feelings. In her large installations, Horn turns objects into mechanical sculptures that move involuntarily and aimlessly, as if controlled by an invisible hand. Rebecca Horn also uses materials associated with Mediaeval alchemy - mercury, coal dust or mirrors. Since the early 1970s she has made a great many films, in which actors play alongside her objects. The most recent of these is »Buster's Bedroom« (1990).
Individual exhibitions (selection)
1973 »Rebecca Horn: Körperraum«, Galerie René Block, Berlin
1974 »Rebecca Horn: Dreaming Under Water«, René Block Gallery, New York
1977 »Rebecca Horn: Zeichnungen, Objekte, Fotos, Video, Filme«, Kunstverein, Cologne, subsequently at Haus am Waldsee, Berlin
1978 »Der Eintänzer. Der Film, die Installation, die Objekte, die Zeichnungen«, Kestner-Gesellschaft, Hannover, subsequently at Stedelijk Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven, Westfälischer Kunstverein, Münster
1981 »La Ferdinanda. Sonate für eine Medici Villa. Rauminstallation und Film«, Staatliche Kunsthalle Baden-Baden
1983 »Rebecca Horn. Zeichnungen. Objekte. Filme«, Centre d'Art Contemporain, Geneva, subsequently at Kunsthaus Zürich, John Hansard Gallery, University of Southampton, Southampton; Serpentine Gallery, Arts Council of Great Britain, London, Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago
1986 »The Gold Rush«, Marian Goodman Gallery, New York; »Rebecca Horn: Nuit et jour sur le dos du serpent à deux têtes«, Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris
1987 »Plötzlich tauchte Buster Keaton als George Washington getarnt in der Bucht auf«, Galerie Konrad Fischer, Düsseldorf
1988 »A Rather Wild Flirtation«, Galerie de France, Paris
1990 »Rebecca Horn: Diving through Buster's Bedroom«, Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles
1991 »Rebecca Horn: Heuschreckenkonzert«, Galerie Franck + Schulte, Berlin; »Buster's Bedroom«, Elisabeth Kaufmann Gallery, Basle
1992 »Rebecca Horn: El riu de la lluna«, Fundació Espai Poblenou, Barcelona; »Ballet of the Woodpeckers«, Tate Gallery, London
1993 »Rebecca Horn«, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, subsequently at Stedelijk Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin - Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Neue Nationalgalerie, Berlin, Kunsthalle Wien, London, Grenoble; »Dialog der Silberschaukeln, 1979«, Neues Museum Weserburg, Bremen
1994 »Room of mutual destruction«, Galerie Franck + Schulte, Berlin
1997 »The Glance of Infinity«, Kestner-Gesellschaft, Hannover
Group exhibitions (selection)
1972 documenta V, Kassel
1974 »Projects: Video II«, The Museum of Modern Art, New York
1975 9. Biennale de Paris, Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris
1977 documenta VI, Kassel
1978 »Video-Symposium«, Tokyo
1980 Biennale di Venezia, Venice
1982 The Biennale of Sydney, The Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney; »Videokunst in Deutschland 1963-1982«, Kunstverein, Cologne, subsequently at Hamburger Kunsthalle, Hamburg, Badischer Kunstverein, Karlsruhe, Westfälischer Kunstverein, Münster, and at venues in Munich, Nuremberg, Berlin; documenta VII, Kassel
1983 »Sculpture from Germany«, Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, subsequently at University of Houston, Sarah Campbell Blaffer Gallery, Houston, Winnipeg Art
Gallery, Winnipeg, Hamilton, Austin, Flushing, New York
1984 »von hier aus«, Messegelände, Düsseldorf
1985 »1945-1985. Kunst in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland«, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin - Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Neue Nationalgalerie, Berlin
1986 Biennale di Venezia, Venice
1987 »Skulptur. Projekte in Münster 1987«, Münster; »From the Europe of Old«, Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam
1988 The Biennale of Sydney, The Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney
1989 »Magiciens de la terre«, Musée National d'Art Moderne, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris
1991 »Interferenzen - Kunst aus West Berlin 1960-1990«, Nationales Kunstmuseum, Riga, subsequently at Manège, Staint Petersburg
1992 documenta IX, Kassel; »Performing Objects«, The Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston
1994 »East of Eden«, Museum Schloss Mosigkau, Dessau; »A Sculpture Show«, Marian Goodman Gallery, New York
1995 Centro Cultural de Belém, Lisbon
1997 »Skulptur. Projekte in Münster 1997«, Münster
[Katharina Raab, 1997]
