Markus Keibel

Material presence and its transformation define the art of Markus Keibel (b. Stuttgart, 1964; lives and works in Berlin), which is often propelled by questions concerning the conditions of human existence. Keibel’s works almost always gesture beyond the public or institutional spaces in which he installs and stages them. In his pigment actions, for example, he spreads pigment on intersections, staircases, or gallery floors, creating clearly delineated fields in various colors that are then smudged, mixed, and worn away as visitors walk or cars drive across them. His conversation with migrants about the essence of freedom led to Zehn Fragen zur Freiheit ( Ten Questions about Freedom, 2005), a temporary work on the glass walls of the Kunstverein building in Pforzheim; the participants’ answers were scratched into the walls and were clearly legible or mirror-inverted depending on the beholder’s standpoint. How and why does something become visible? In Markus Keibel’s work, the answer is neither fixed nor definitive; it appears as an experience of primary energies or a visualization of human thoughts. With essays by Mark Gisbourne and Claudia Friedrich Seidel and a conversation between Gunnar Lutzow, Jeni Fulton, and Markus Keibel.