Stephan Balkenhol (born 1957, Fritzlar, Hesse, Germany) is a German

artist An artist is a person engaged in an activity related to creating art, practicing the arts, or demonstrating an art. The common usage in both everyday speech and academic discourse refers to a practitioner in the visual arts only. However, t ...

, famous for his figurative painted wooden sculptures and reliefs. He is currently Professor of Sculpture at the State Academy of Fine Arts Karlsruhe (Germany). Lives and works in

Karlsruhe Karlsruhe ( , , ; South Franconian German, South Franconian: ''Kallsruh'') is the List of cities in Baden-Württemberg by population, third-largest city of the German States of Germany, state (''Land'') of Baden-Württemberg after its capital o ...

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG),, is a country in Central Europe. It is the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany lies between the Baltic and North Sea to the north and the Alps to the sou ...

and Meisenthal,

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan ar ...

Life and career

Balkenhol attended the Hamburg School of Fine Arts from 1976 to 1982, and studied under Ulrich Rückriem with

Nam June Paik Nam June Paik (; July 20, 1932 – January 29, 2006) was a Korean American artist. He worked with a variety of media and is considered to be the founder of video art. He is credited with the first use (1974) of the term "electronic super hi ...

and

Sigmar Polke Sigmar Polke (13 February 1941 – 10 June 2010) was a German painter and photographer. Polke experimented with a wide range of styles, subject matters and materials. In the 1970s, he concentrated on photography, returning to paint in the 1980s ...

among his tutors. Balkenhol began sculptural wood carving in the mid-1980s. His totem-like sculptures of everyday people continue the European tradition of wooden sculpture and reference folk art and medieval and classical Greek sculpture. As a response to the abstract, minimalist and conceptual approaches of the Hamburg School, Balkenhol decided to concentrate on an everyday persona, instead of an idol or hero. By the 1990s, his repertoire had expanded to include animals and hybrid creatures, as well as architectural motifs and reliefs. Balkenhol's work is a concatenation of sensuality, vivacity, monumentality and humor. His figures emanate timelessness: simple, plain-colored clothing and the confident yet unassuming poses of familiar yet anonymous men and women who show no subjective feelings or emotions and contain no sociological or socio-critical references. The artist uses a variety of woods, such as poplar, Douglas fir and wawa wood, and hand carves each piece from a single block using hammers, power saws and chisels, leaving behind shavings and traces visible in the wood, with its knots, grain and cracks. He then uses paint to structure the sculpture and accentuate the anatomy, without in any way heightening the figure's expressiveness. His human figures are never polished to waxy smoothness and artifice. Like humans, they would not be themselves without imperfections. The rough surfaces and cuts create a sense of life force hidden inside seemingly apathetic humans – evidence of the artist's love of and faith in humanity. Balkenhol's work has been shown in numerous solo exhibitions around the world, including the

Lehmbruck Museum The Stiftung Wilhelm Lehmbruck Museum - Center for International Sculpture is a museum in Duisburg, Germany. Sculptures by Wilhelm Lehmbruck, after whom the museum is named, make up a large part of its collection. However, the museum has a su ...

(Duisburg, Germany), Museum Jorn (Silkeborg, Denmark), Landes Museum (Linz, Austria),

Museum of Contemporary Art Museum of Contemporary Art (often abbreviated to MCA, MoCA or MOCA) may refer to: Africa * Museum of Contemporary Art (Tangier), Morocco, officially le Galerie d'Art Contemporain Mohamed Drissi Asia East Asia * Museum of Contemporary Art Shangha ...

(Los Angeles, CA, USA), MKM Museum Küppersmühle für moderne Kunst (Duisburg, Germany),

Museum of Grenoble The Museum of Grenoble (french: Musée de Grenoble) is a municipal museum of Fine Arts and antiquities in the city of Grenoble in the Isère region of France. Located on the left bank of the Isère River, place Lavalette, it is known both for i ...

(Grenoble, France) and Staatliche Kunsthalle (Baden-Baden, Germany).

Artist's public installations

Balkenhol has also completed a significant number of public commissions in his career. Among them are the ''“Big Head Column”'' for the Peggy Guggenheim Collection (Venice, Italy), ''“Big Man with a Little Man”'' for Pariser Platz (Berlin, Germany), ''“Man and Woman”'' for Hamburg Central Library (Hamburg, Germany), ''“Everyman”'' for the Edinburgh City Council Offices (Edinburgh, Scotland) and ''“Man with Tower Block”'' (Toronto, Canada). File:Mannaufgiraffe.jpg, 'Man on Giraffe' in the

Tierpark Hagenbeck The Tierpark Hagenbeck is a zoo in Stellingen, Hamburg, Germany. The collection began in 1863 with animals that belonged to Carl Hagenbeck Sr. (1810–1887), a fishmonger who became an amateur animal collector. The park itself was founded by C ...

File:Balkenhol Mann und Frau.jpg, "Man + Woman" in Hamburg in front of the Central Library of the Hamburger Öffentliche Bücherhallen File:Lörrach - Große Säulenfigur1.jpg, Large column figure in

Lörrach Lörrach () is a town in southwest Germany, in the valley of the Wiese, close to the French and the Swiss borders. It is the capital of the district of Lörrach in Baden-Württemberg. It is the home of a number of large employers, including the ...

File:Mann mit Hirsch IMG 9260.JPG, alt=, "Man with deer" in Hannover, Lower Saxony, Germany File:Wagner-Denkmal Leipzig.jpg, Richard Wagner Memorial in Leipzig on a pedestal by

Max Klinger Max Klinger (18 February 1857 – 5 July 1920) was a German artist who produced significant work in painting, sculpture, prints and graphics, as well as writing a treatise articulating his ideas on art and the role of graphic arts and printmak ...

File:Balkenhol Emma Hellenstainer 2015.jpg, "Emma" Contribution to the Merano Art Project "HumanShapes"

Awards

* 2016 Honorary membership of the

Academy of Russian Arts An academy (Attic Greek: Ἀκαδήμεια; Koine Greek Ἀκαδημία) is an institution of secondary education, secondary or tertiary education, tertiary higher education, higher learning (and generally also research or honorary membershi ...

, Saint Petersburg, Russia * 2014

Ordre des Arts et des Lettres The ''Ordre des Arts et des Lettres'' (Order of Arts and Letters) is an order Order, ORDER or Orders may refer to: * Categorization, the process in which ideas and objects are recognized, differentiated, and understood * Heterarchy, a system ...

, France * 1990 Bremen Art Prize, Bremen, Germany * 1989 Sponsorship Award, International Prize of the State of Baden-Württemberg, Germany * 1983 Karl Schmidt Rottluff Grant * 1986 Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg Grant, Hamburg, Germany

Public collections

Art Institute of Chicago The Art Institute of Chicago in Chicago's Grant Park, founded in 1879, is one of the oldest and largest art museums in the world. Recognized for its curatorial efforts and popularity among visitors, the museum hosts approximately 1.5 mil ...

(Chicago, IL, USA) * Birmingham Museum of Art (Birmingham, AL, USA) * Broad Museum (Los Angeles, CA, USA) * Carnegie Museum in Pittsburgh (Pittsburgh, PA, USA) *

Hamburger Bahnhof Hamburger Bahnhof is the former terminus of the Berlin–Hamburg Railway in Berlin, Germany, on Invalidenstrasse in the Moabit district opposite the Charité hospital. Today it serves as a contemporary art museum, the , part of the Berlin ...

(Berlin, Germany) *

Hirshhorn Museum The Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden is an art museum beside the National Mall, in Washington, D.C., the United States. The museum was initially endowed during the 1960s with the permanent art collection of Joseph H. Hirshhorn. It was de ...

(Washington, DC, USA) *

Kunstmuseum Bonn The Kunstmuseum Bonn or Bonn Museum of Modern Art is an art museum in Bonn, Germany, founded in 1947. The Kunstmuseum exhibits both temporary exhibitions and its collection. Its collection is focused on Rhenish Expressionism and post-war German ...

(Bonn, Germany) * Le CEAAC (Strasbourg, France) *

Los Angeles County Museum of Art The Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) is an art museum located on Wilshire Boulevard in the Miracle Mile vicinity of Los Angeles. LACMA is on Museum Row, adjacent to the La Brea Tar Pits (George C. Page Museum). LACMA was founded in 196 ...

(LACMA) (Los Angeles, CA, USA) * Ludwig Forum für Internationale Kunst (Aachen, Germany) * Museu Berardo (Lisbon, Portugal) *

Museum Ludwig Museum Ludwig, located in Cologne, Germany, houses a collection of modern art. It includes works from Pop Art, Abstract and Surrealism, and has one of the largest Picasso collections in Europe. It holds many works by Andy Warhol and Roy Lich ...

(Cologne, Germany) * Museum of Modern Art in Frankfurt (Frankfurt, Germany) * National Museum of Art (Osaka, Japan) *

Neue Pinakothek The Neue Pinakothek (, ''New Pinacotheca'') is an art museum in Munich, Germany. Its focus is European Art of the 18th and 19th centuries, and it is one of the most important museums of art of the nineteenth century in the world. Together with t ...

(München, Germany) * Pasadena Museum of California Art (Los Angeles, CA, USA) *

Peggy Guggenheim Marguerite "Peggy" Guggenheim ( ; August 26, 1898 – December 23, 1979) was an American art collector, bohemian and socialite. Born to the wealthy New York City Guggenheim family, she was the daughter of Benjamin Guggenheim, who went down with ...

(Venice, Italy) *

Seattle Art Museum The Seattle Art Museum (commonly known as SAM) is an art museum located in Seattle, Washington, United States. It operates three major facilities: its main museum in downtown Seattle; the Seattle Asian Art Museum (SAAM) in Volunteer Park on C ...

(Seattle, WA, USA)

References

External links

Stephan Balkenhol.BTHVN
at MKM Museum Küppersmühle for Modern Art website {{DEFAULTSORT:Balkenhol, Stephan Living people 1957 births German artists People from Fritzlar