Stefan Strumbel

Sep 5, 2014

Berlin

During the very first year of Wertical, we already met Stefan Strumbel for an interview. Ever since, we follow the career of the German artist. Today, this leads us to Berlin where Circle Culture Gallery opens Stefan Strumbel’s solo exhibition what the fuck is heimat?*.

The involvement with the subject “Heimat“ is one of the key features in Stefan Strumbel’s œuvre. This term can be considered as a metaphor for experiences of socialization and for the establishment of identity, which appear to be anachronistic in a globalized and digitized world. At his solo exhibition “what the fuck is heimat?*” Strumbel examines the theme “Heimat” with canvases and prints as well as objects and installations, and transforms ethnic clichés while using subjects and anglicisms from Pop Art and everyday culture.

Stefan Strumbel started out with graffiti, but finally turned to legal art instead. Like pop stars who suddenly light up the sky of music, Strumbel stormed on to the art scene with a breakthrough installation – a reinterpretation of the traditional cuckoo clock.

The first person to buy one was a veterinary surgeon. Another memorable customer was fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld, who posed with one of the clocks in a self-portrait published in Stern magazine in 2008.

Starker Wind, 2014, spray paint on hand carved timber sculpture, photo: anna.k.o.