Ulrich Rückriem (born 30 September 1938) is a German

sculptor Sculpture is the branch of the visual arts that operates in three dimensions. Sculpture is the three-dimensional art work which is physically presented in the dimensions of height, width and depth. It is one of the plastic arts. Durable sc ...

notable for his monumental stone sculptures. He lives and works in

Cologne Cologne ( ; ; ) is the largest city of the States of Germany, German state of North Rhine-Westphalia and the List of cities in Germany by population, fourth-most populous city of Germany with nearly 1.1 million inhabitants in the city pr ...

and

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

. His abstract works of art are often assigned to the style of

minimalism In visual arts, music, and other media, minimalism is an art movement that began in the post-war era in western art. The movement is often interpreted as a reaction to abstract expressionism and modernism; it anticipated contemporary post-mi ...

and

process art Process art is an artistic movement where the end product of art and craft, the '':wikt:objet d’art, objet d’art'' (work of art/found object), is not the principal focus; the process of its making is one of the most relevant aspects if not th ...

Life and work

Born in

Düsseldorf Düsseldorf is the capital city of North Rhine-Westphalia, the most populous state of Germany. It is the second-largest city in the state after Cologne and the List of cities in Germany with more than 100,000 inhabitants, seventh-largest city ...

, Rückriem apprenticed as a stonecutter in

Düren Düren (; Ripuarian language, Ripuarian: Düre) is a town in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, between Aachen and Cologne, on the river Rur (river), Rur. History Roman era The area of Düren was part of Gallia Belgica, more specifically the ter ...

and then worked as a journeyman at the Dombauhütte workshops of Cologne Cathedral. Later, due to his tight association with Gallery Konrad Fischer, Düsseldorf, he came into contact with artists and colleagues like

Carl Andre Carl Andre (September 16, 1935 – January 24, 2024) was an American minimalist artist recognized for his ordered linear and grid format sculptures. His sculptures range from large public artworks (such as ''Stone Field Sculpture'', 1977, in ...

, Richard Long,

Sol LeWitt Solomon "Sol" LeWitt (September 9, 1928 – April 8, 2007) was an American artist linked to various movements, including conceptual art and minimalism. LeWitt came to fame in the late 1960s with his wall drawings and "structures" (a term he pref ...

, and Royden Rabinowitch. From 1963 on, he worked as a free-lance artist. For a few years he shared a studio with

Blinky Palermo Blinky Palermo, artistic name of ''Peter Schwarze'' (2 June 1943 - 18 February 1977), was a German abstract painter. He was inspired by painters like Kazimir Malevich, Barnett Newman and Ellsworth Kelly. Life and career Palermo was born Peter ...

, before he started his academic career, at

Hochschule für bildende Künste Hamburg The , also known as HFBK Hamburg, is an arts university in Hamburg, in northern Germany. It dates to 1767, when it was called the ; later it became known as . The main building, in the Uhlenhorst quarter of Hamburg-Nord borough, was designed by ...

(starting from 1974), from 1984 on at

Kunstakademie Düsseldorf The Kunstakademie Düsseldorf is the academy of fine arts of the state of North Rhine Westphalia at the city of Düsseldorf, Germany. Notable artists who studied or taught at the academy include Joseph Beuys, Gerhard Richter, Blinky Palermo, Ma ...

, and finally at

Städelschule The Städelschule, full name Hochschule für Bildende Künste–Städelschule, is a tertiary school of art in Frankfurt am Main, Germany. It accepts about 20 students each year from around 500 applicants, and has a total of approximately 150 ...

, In the 1960s and 1070s, Rückriem worked in the quarry of Dolomite at Anldorf, museum

Städel The Städel, officially the ''Städelsches Kunstinstitut und Städtische Galerie'', is an art museum in Frankfurt, with one of the most important collections in Germany. The museum is located at the Museumsufer on the Sachsenhausen bank of t ...

Frankfurt am Main Frankfurt am Main () is the most populous city in the States of Germany, German state of Hesse. Its 773,068 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the List of cities in Germany by population, fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located in the forela ...

Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam The Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam (; Municipal Museum Amsterdam), colloquially known as the Stedelijk, is a museum for modern art, contemporary art, and design located in Amsterdam, Netherlands.

and

Neue Nationalgalerie The Neue Nationalgalerie (New National Gallery) at the Kulturforum is a museum for modern art in Berlin, with its main focus on the 20th century. It is part of the National Gallery of the Berlin State Museums. The museum building and its sculpt ...

Berlin followed. Rückriem was invited to participate in the

documenta Documenta (often stylized documenta) is an Art exhibition, exhibition of contemporary art which takes place every five years in Kassel, Germany. Documenta was founded by artist, teacher and curator Arnold Bode in 1955 as part of the Bundesgarte ...

i. Many of the works of art of Rückriem are accessible to the public as

public art Public art is art in any Media (arts), media whose form, function and meaning are created for the general public through a public process. It is a specific art genre with its own professional and critical discourse. Public art is visually and phy ...

, mostly in Germany, but also in Spain, France, England, Ireland and others. A particularly impressive one of these is ''Siglo XX'' (1995), an installation in the open fields close to the locality of Abiego (Spain). It consists of 20 steles of granite from

O Porriño O Porriño is a municipality in the province of Pontevedra, in the autonomous community of Galicia, Spain. It belongs to the comarca of Vigo. As an industrial town in the Vigo metropolitan area, it has an important economic significance. One ...

, arranged in a manner analogous to the

eight queens puzzle The eight queens puzzle is the problem of placing eight chess queens on an 8×8 chessboard so that no two queens threaten each other; thus, a solution requires that no two queens share the same row, column, or diagonal. There are 92 solutions. ...

.ULRICH RÜCKRIEM: Siglo XX, 1995
Centro de Arte y Naturaleza Fundación Beulas. Retrieved on 16 August 2013. A permanent installation of about 100 sculptures by Rückriem is at ''Sculpture Halls Ulrich Rückriem'' in Sinsteden, near Cologne. The halls and presentation were devised by the artist himself.

Gallery

File:Heine1.JPG, Heine-Denkmal (1982).

Bonn Bonn () is a federal city in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia, located on the banks of the Rhine. With a population exceeding 300,000, it lies about south-southeast of Cologne, in the southernmost part of the Rhine-Ruhr region. This ...

File:Rückriem Moltkeplatz Essen.JPG, Dolomit (1983).

Essen Essen () is the central and, after Dortmund, second-largest city of the Ruhr, the largest urban area in Germany. Its population of makes it the fourth-largest city of North Rhine-Westphalia after Cologne, Düsseldorf and Dortmund, as well as ...

File:Ulrich Rückriem Granit gespalten 1985.jpg, Granit (Normandie) (1985).

Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...

File:8 Limestones, Dublin, May 2011 (02).JPG, ''Limestone'' (1988).

Irish Museum of Modern Art The Irish Museum of Modern Art (), also known as IMMA, is Ireland's leading national institution for the collection and presentation of modern and contemporary art. It is located in Kilmainham, Dublin. History Irish art collector Gordon Lam ...

Dublin Dublin is the capital and largest city of Republic of Ireland, Ireland. Situated on Dublin Bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Leinster, and is bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, pa ...

File:RueckriemCastellZollverein.jpg, ''Castell'' (1991). Mining waste tip Zollverein at

Zollverein Coal Mine Industrial Complex The Zollverein Coal Mine Industrial Complex (German Zeche Zollverein) is a large former industrial site in the city of Essen, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. The first coal mine on the premises was founded in 1847, and mining activities took pl ...

File:Ulrich Rueckriem Finnischer Granit gespalten 1992-93 Goethe-Institut Muenchen-2.jpg, ''Finnischer Granit gespalten'' (1992/93).

Goethe-Institut The Goethe-Institut (; GI, ''Goethe Institute'') is a Nonprofit organization, nonprofit German culture, cultural organization operational worldwide with more than 150 cultural centres, promoting the study of the German language abroad and en ...

Munich Munich is the capital and most populous city of Bavaria, Germany. As of 30 November 2024, its population was 1,604,384, making it the third-largest city in Germany after Berlin and Hamburg. Munich is the largest city in Germany that is no ...

File:Standing stones, Outwood.jpg, ''7 Steles'' (1999). Irwell Sculpture Trail, England File:Bilbao-Rueckriem-11 5099.JPG, ''Untitled'' (2003). Muelle de Evaristo Ghurruca,

Bilbao Bilbao is a city in northern Spain, the largest city in the Provinces of Spain, province of Biscay and in the Basque Country (greater region), Basque Country as a whole. It is also the largest city proper in northern Spain. Bilbao is the List o ...

File:Granit Rosa Porrino von Ulrich Rueckriem in Loerrach.jpg, Granite statue in Loerrach

References

Bibliography

* ''Ulrich Rückriem: Arbeiten'', Editor: Heinrich Erhardt, Oktagon, 1994. (in German) * Jürgen Hohmeyer: ''Ulrich Rückriem'', Verlag Silke Schreiber, 1988. (in German)

External links

Ulrich Rückriem – artist biography
(Tate Gallery)
Sculpture Halls Ulrich Rückriem
Sinsteden (in German)

– works in public spaces (in German) {{DEFAULTSORT:Ruckriem, Ulrich 1938 births Living people 20th-century German sculptors 20th-century German male artists German male sculptors 21st-century German sculptors 21st-century German male artists Minimalist artists German contemporary artists

Life and work

Gallery

See also

References

Bibliography

External links