POP;68

Ellen Antico BLIZZY 2023 Oil, charcoal, soft pastels on canvas 170 × 170 cm 66 7/8 × 66 7/8 in Unique

Opening today Saturday, 8 July, 6-8pm Ellen Antico 
Wrestling with Angels 09.07.23 - 01.10.23 Ellen Antico (b. 1989, Sydney, AU) presents her first solo exhibition Wrestling with Angels at Pop;68 in Cologne. For this body of work, Antico depicts notions of mutual resonances and conditions, attempting to capture the rawness and intensity at the climax of a fight. At this precise point of highly entangled and intertwined figures, it is not a combative spirit that stands out most, but rather the sensual intimacy of bodies relating to each other. Contours merge, dissolve, and only let fragmentary body parts appear clearly. A monochrome color scheme of blues, greens and reds occupies the canvases, unfolding the depiction of movement, of gestures and facial expressions. The intentionality of the encounters as fights, performances or loving acts recedes from the surface to open up a field in which the pure beauty of human bodies is explored. Deconstructed forms of these acts of wrestling, reduced to charcoal strokes on canvas that seem like preliminary drawings, appear like a study of faces, hands and feet, revealing perceptions of the nature of physical existence. Between competition, humor and sensual seduction a profound fascination for the inherent beauty of embodiment emanates, and is substantiated throughout the exhibition.

Save the date: Opening this Saturday, 8 July, 6-8pm Ellen Antico 
Wrestling with Angels 09.07.23 - 01.10.23 Ellen Antico (b. 1989, Sydney, AU) presents her first solo exhibition Wrestling with Angels at Pop;68 in Cologne. For this body of work, Antico depicts notions of mutual resonances and conditions, attempting to capture the rawness and intensity at the climax of a fight. At this precise point of highly entangled and intertwined figures, it is not a combative spirit that stands out most, but rather the sensual intimacy of bodies relating to each other. Contours merge, dissolve, and only let fragmentary body parts appear clearly. A monochrome color scheme of blues, greens and reds occupies the canvases, unfolding the depiction of movement, of gestures and facial expressions. The intentionality of the encounters as fights, performances or loving acts recedes from the surface to open up a field in which the pure beauty of human bodies is explored. Deconstructed forms of these acts of wrestling, reduced to charcoal strokes on canvas that seem like preliminary drawings, appear like a study of faces, hands and feet, revealing perceptions of the nature of physical existence. Between competition, humor and sensual seduction a profound fascination for the inherent beauty of embodiment emanates, and is substantiated throughout the exhibition.

Last weekend to see: Michael Günzer Acker Acker Until 02.07.23 Michael Günzer (b.1982, DE) presents his first solo exhibition Acker Acker at POP;68 in Cologne. Two groups of works are at the center of the exhibition, showing human bodies or sections of them in different techniques and materiality. In their painterly translation, the figuration blurs in places into an autonomous abstraction that – through multiple applications of paint and subsequent sanding – arises from a barely controllable moment. The canvases place the depicted, unadulterated bodies in versatile contexts, they are intertwined, they wrestle and tussle with each other. Their contours sometimes appear clear and precise, sometimes blurred and hazy while creating moments of irritation that the eye lingers on. The works on paper, series of portraits that reproduce the ever-same motif, while telling an ever-different story, represent duplications of themselves. The deformations and discolorations of their simulacra create nuanced shifts in facial expressions, atmosphere, and its impact. In tedious, ongoing processes, fruits of a protracted work emerge gradually, draw furrows in the artist’s body of work that is embedded in and has risen out of contemporary conditions.

Michael Günzer Acker Acker Until 02.07.23 Michael Günzer (b.1982, DE) presents his first solo exhibition Acker Acker at POP;68 in Cologne. Two groups of works are at the center of the exhibition, showing human bodies or sections of them in different techniques and materiality. In their painterly translation, the figuration blurs in places into an autonomous abstraction that – through multiple applications of paint and subsequent sanding – arises from a barely controllable moment. The canvases place the depicted, unadulterated bodies in versatile contexts, they are intertwined, they wrestle and tussle with each other. Their contours sometimes appear clear and precise, sometimes blurred and hazy while creating moments of irritation that the eye lingers on. The works on paper, series of portraits that reproduce the ever-same motif, while telling an ever-different story, represent duplications of themselves. The deformations and discolorations of their simulacra create nuanced shifts in facial expressions, atmosphere, and its impact. In tedious, ongoing processes, fruits of a protracted work emerge gradually, draw furrows in the artist’s body of work that is embedded in and has risen out of contemporary conditions.

Michael Günzer Gangsigns 2023 Oil on canvas 90 x 70 cm 35 3/8 x 27 1/2 in Unique

Michael Günzer Acker Acker Until 02.07.23 Michael Günzer (b.1982, DE) presents his first solo exhibition Acker Acker at POP;68 in Cologne. Two groups of works are at the center of the exhibition, showing human bodies or sections of them in different techniques and materiality. In their painterly translation, the figuration blurs in places into an autonomous abstraction that – through multiple applications of paint and subsequent sanding – arises from a barely controllable moment. The canvases place the depicted, unadulterated bodies in versatile contexts, they are intertwined, they wrestle and tussle with each other. Their contours sometimes appear clear and precise, sometimes blurred and hazy while creating moments of irritation that the eye lingers on. The works on paper, series of portraits that reproduce the ever-same motif, while telling an ever-different story, represent duplications of themselves. The deformations and discolorations of their simulacra create nuanced shifts in facial expressions, atmosphere, and its impact. In tedious, ongoing processes, fruits of a protracted work emerge gradually, draw furrows in the artist’s body of work that is embedded in and has risen out of contemporary conditions.

Michael Günzer Hands on the back 2022 Oil on canvas 120 x 90 cm, 47 1/4 x 35 3/8 in Unique

Opening today 6-8pm Michael Günzer Acker Acker 01.04.23 - 02.07.23 Michael Günzer (b.1982, DE) presents his first solo exhibition Acker Acker at POP;68 in Cologne. Two groups of works are at the center of the exhibition, showing human bodies or sections of them in different techniques and materiality. In their painterly translation, the figuration blurs in places into an autonomous abstraction that – through multiple applications of paint and subsequent sanding – arises from a barely controllable moment. The canvases place the depicted, unadulterated bodies in versatile contexts, they are intertwined, they wrestle and tussle with each other. Their contours sometimes appear clear and precise, sometimes blurred and hazy while creating moments of irritation that the eye lingers on. The works on paper, series of portraits that reproduce the ever-same motif, while telling an ever-different story, represent duplications of themselves. The deformations and discolorations of their simulacra create nuanced shifts in facial expressions, atmosphere, and its impact. In tedious, ongoing processes, fruits of a protracted work emerge gradually, draw furrows in the artist’s body of work that is embedded in and has risen out of contemporary conditions.

POP;68 Opening this Saturday, 6-8pm Michael Günzer Acker Acker 01.04.23 - 02.07.23 Michael Günzer (b.1982, DE) presents his first solo exhibition Acker Acker at POP;68 in Cologne. Two groups of works are at the center of the exhibition, showing human bodies or sections of them in different techniques and materiality. In their painterly translation, the figuration blurs in places into an autonomous abstraction that – through multiple applications of paint and subsequent sanding – arises from a barely controllable moment. The canvases place the depicted, unadulterated bodies in versatile contexts, they are intertwined, they wrestle and tussle with each other. Their contours sometimes appear clear and precise, sometimes blurred and hazy while creating moments of irritation that the eye lingers on. The works on paper, series of portraits that reproduce the ever-same motif, while telling an ever-different story, represent duplications of themselves. The deformations and discolorations of their simulacra create nuanced shifts in facial expressions, atmosphere, and its impact. In tedious, ongoing processes, fruits of a protracted work emerge gradually, draw furrows in the artist’s body of work that is embedded in and has risen out of contemporary conditions.

COLOGNE: Save the date March 26th 3-6pm Adrian Falkner and Nomad will present and sign the collaboration magazine next Sunday at Pop;68 The magazine is a „two in one magazine“ designed by paravirtualized and printed as a risography at colorama Berlin. Limited Edition 300 copies. Price: 20€ excl. VAT

Adrian Falkner Spolia Until 26/03/2023 Adrian Falkner presents his first solo exhibition Spolia at Pop;68 in Cologne. He reappropriates own, finished works, transforms them and embeds them into new contexts. Thus they incorporate an ambiguity and cannot be clearly attributed to any discipline or genre. They transcend the separation of art in public spaces and art in institutions by creating - aware of all specific possibilities and limitations - their own architecture from elements inherent to both spaces. Topsoil of the work is coarse, rough linen fabric, which has collected traces of life on the studio floor for several years, preserving a part of the environment in which it is embedded, before it becomes the motif carrier. Similar to surfaces in public spaces, the unplanned and the intuitive become part of the medium while the artist turns into its architect by cutting up and rejoining canvases using a sewing machine. In several construction steps, the separation between background and motif, front and back, appropriation and design, blur and typefaces emerge that want to be looked at rather than read. Through an unconventional hanging comprising the use of construction components, the works themselves turn into architectural elements of the gallery space and allow a contemplation of their backs. "Spolia" plays with the translation of an inside and an outside through pai nting, and in doing so enables the recognition of the potential of interstices as a permeable means of communication.