BERLIN at the WALL G.L. Gabriel

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BERLIN AT THE WALL

G.L. Gabriel Broschuere:Layout 1 16.09.2009 16:58 Uhr Seite 2

for Fred and Mienske Broschuere:Layout 1 16.09.2009 16:58 Uhr Seite 3

BERLIN AT THE WALL

G.L. Gabriel Broschuere:Layout 1 16.09.2009 16:31 Uhr Seite 4

G.L. Gabriel, “Blue Drawbridge at the Kupfergraben in East Berlin-Mitte”, mixed technique on canvas, 78.7 x 78.7 in. (200 x 200 cm), 1986 Broschuere:Layout 1 16.09.2009 16:31 Uhr Seite 5

Welcoming speech by Walter Momper, President of the State Parliament of Berlin, for the catalog of artist Gabriele Gabriel's opening exhibition at the DIETZ gallery in New York in October 2009.

This year marks the twentieth anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall on November 9th, 1989. Interest in this significant historical event remains unbro- ken to this day – historically and politically speaking, but also artistically. The visual arts captured events along this inhumane border in various ways. Its forbidding monumentality and its significance as an insurmountable dividing line between East and West throughout the city have fortunately been a matter of history for the past twenty years. The Berlin Wall left its mark on the city, where it forced a number of changes. During its construction, roads were diverted, death zones were created, and buildings were demolished or blocked up. In turn, the fall of the Wall spawned new houses, public squares, traffic routes and gathering places. Tourists who visit the memorials today and follow the Wall's path through the city are often deeply moved. They catch a glimpse of the reality that was forced upon Berlin's residents on both sides of the Wall for 28 long years. Families were torn apart, friends separated. An unobstructed view on both sides became impossible. Gabriele Gabriel has been living and working in Berlin for 50 years, and has documented the transformation of the city in many of her paintings. Since 2004, the State Parliament of Berlin also houses three of her impressive urban landscapes. The artist knows Berlin from the time before, during and after the separation. Gabriele Gabriel's work reflects her great interest in the urban scenes of Berlin. I would like to thank the artist Gabriele Gabriel for her curiosity about the city and the impact it has had on the rest of the world, and I wish her all the best for the exhibition.

Walter Momper President of the State Parliament of Berlin

At the time of the fall of the Wall in 1989, Walter Momper was the governing mayor of West Berlin. Broschuere:Layout 1 16.09.2009 16:31 Uhr Seite 6

G.L. Gabriel, “Wall, by Night at the Spree River by the Reichstag”, mixed technique on paper, 30.7 x 34.3 in. (78 x 87 cm), 1987 Broschuere:Layout 1 16.09.2009 16:31 Uhr Seite 7

Berlin – Revisited

In October 2009, I will be happy to present a selection of the recently created print work by G.L. Gabriel at Dietzspace, a small alternative exhibitions space in Tribeca, New York’s newest fashionable Downtown area. Gabi Thieler, aka G.L. Gabriel, and I met at the Hoch- schule der Künste in Berlin in 1976. We both survived our first year with Professor Knispel, a hard-driving Ex- Bauhaus teacher, who had escaped from East Germany, and who made us work from nine to five, following a very narrow curriculum. After this mandatory regiment, we both chose the class of K.H. Hödicke, the most avant- garde, youngest and wildest professor at the academy. Spending much time together, I was very early aware of Gabi’s immense talent as a painter. I enjoyed dressing up and sitting for her, listening to music, and observing her painting and tackling ever-bigger canvases. Our closeness was also a need for combating the dominating male supremacy of our neo-expressionist classmates, like Fetting, Middendorf, and Salome. Women painters were just in the minority at the school as well as the bars and clubs where everyone hung out. In the early 1980’s, the wall was still surrounding Berlin, and Berlin was a pretty small town. Although still enrolled as a student, I spend many months in New York City, making super 8 movies and taking in the art and music scene. After school, I moved to New York City for good, and we lost touch for a while. Although, I followed her career from afar, her work has always managed to deeply surprise and move me. Her paintings became more beautiful and daring with each catalog I received. They became dense and abstracted down to their barebones essence with no room for frills or hesitant moments. They seemed to be created in one big effortless sweep, with paint just floating above the surface, held in check by black charcoal markings. Her handwriting. The work presented in this catalogue exhibits the same handling of paint and subject matter. Unnecessary objects are filtered out, only the main focus remains. Naturally, Berlin has changed a lot since I left in 1982. I am sure I won’t recog- nize the city as it grew, merged, and became a European Metropolis. However, looking at Gabi’s images, I see the timeless structures that still match my memory. As an artist and curator, I believe G.L. Gabriel remains one of the great painters, who came of age at the height of the Neo-Expressionist era of the 1980’s, and who still needs to be discovered by the broader art world.

Dir. Karin Luner, New York, 2009

Photo: Dora Champbell, Dir. Karin Luner at the Dietzspace Gallery, 2009 Broschuere:Layout 1 16.09.2009 16:31 Uhr Seite 8

THE MAKING OF "FACTORY AT THE WALL" This captures all of the image informa- tion, including the barely perceptible, An image of an image. A challenge for reproduction. G.L. Gabriel’s technique for printing. This data is then transfer- uses high-resolution photographed panoramic images on barite photo paper as a red to the printing plate by means of a basis over which she paints a thin layer of color. The precision of the photographic lossless CTP standardization. In short document vanishes in the emotional view of the repainted cityscape, much in the order, the enormous printing machine sense of an interplay: the perceived psyche of the place converges on silhouetted is properly adjusted. The first color points of reference in the black-and-white copy. This series "Factory at the Wall" print from the series "Factory" is in the exists in different collections and at different locations. Twenty years after the fall delivery tray. He holds up a spectral of the Wall, it is endowed with a new timeliness. photometer to the surface of the photo How does one go about implementing a high-quality, limited-edition reproduction depth. The device is the size of a small to be exhibited in New York as unique works of art? A photographic reproduc- book. He uses it to measure color den- tion seems the best solution to remain true to the original material, for it draws sity. The display indicates a value of 2.8. "The contrast range of the human eye on the photo print, which already forms the basis for G.L. Gabriel's paintings. can detect values of up to 3.0 optical density," he says, "and that is what I want to However, the larger the original format, the more difficult its reproduction achieve." Dieter Kirchner holds up another photograph. It shows the Bibliothèque becomes. The technique of artistic photo-reproduction does not come out of National in Paris by the photographer Manfred Hamm, printed on conventional nowhere, but rather has its roots in centuries-old traditions – from wood carving, photo paper. The values are clearly lower in this picture, and the sharpness is also from Gutenberg's movable type printing and the first lithographies of Alois reduced. Kirchner peers critically through his magnifying glass as he holds up a Senefelder to the method of offset printing. Their defining marks are the limited second draft print of the Bibliothèque National, printed this time using the Skia edition, the signature, and sometimes the seal of authenticity. A new worldwide method. The image gains notably in sharpness and contrast. The new printing development for the production of high-resolution large-format photos is the method allows Kirchner to produce up to a third greater contrast range, meaning "Skia Photography" method, developed by Dieter Kirchner. G.L. Gabriel is the increased sharpness, a greater image range, depth and color accuracy. It is not un- first visual artist to make use of his method. common for an image printed with the new method to suddenly reveal shadings that previously did not even seem to exist. Kirchner has specifically developed his A trip to Hannover. The making of the series "Factory at the Wall". Dieter own color blends that are especially easily gradated. Kirchner is a reprographer and inventor, born in 1943. He has been working in his field since 1964, and he actually lives in the Saxon city of Radebeul and in Three draft prints were so far unable to withstand his and Gabriel's careful scru- Berlin when he isn't travelling to the printing press in Hannover. Here lies the tiny. A further print seems suitable and is already laid out on the delivery table. offset printer XL 105, a product of the traditional manufacturer Heidelberger G.L. Gabriel also brought along the original photo, "Factory". Already, there is no Druckmaschinen, as large as an omnibus. He standardized and established it. To discernable qualitative difference to the original. Kirchner mutters through his photographers, Kirchner is an institution, and he has worked for the Helmut white beard that it is always an additional challenge to work with artists. The last Newton Foundation, Dieter Appelt, Bernd and Hilla Becher, Konrad R. Müller, draft is examined under different types of light. A shredder destroys the color Manfred Hamm and several others. images that did not make the cut. Artistic waste. By and by, 15 select Skia prints are spread out on a table. Dieter Kirchner leans over each picture. The seal, which G.L. Gabriel also arrives in Hannover today. She is travelling from Berlin with he presses into the corner of the 76.38 x 26.57 in. (194 x 67,5 cm) sheet using an five Ektachromes, large-format slides. A photographer had previously taken the archaic pair of tongs, reads "Skia Photography". It appears only as a flat, pressed pictures with a Hasselblatt camera. She wants the meter-long original images to relief. Then G.L. Gabriel numbers and signs each image. An image of an image. be reproduced as precisely as possible from the Ektachromes to original size. "Skia Photography" is the name of the new method Kirchner has applied since the beginning of 2009. In essence, it means "light-dark-typeface". It replaces the Christian Pricelius conventional contact prints on photo paper in the darkroom – "because the publicist in Berlin image range is too small on photo paper", says Dieter Kirchner. In the "Skia" method, the data from the negative or slide image is digitalized in two gamma curves and computed into four main gamma curves in an electronic darkroom. G.L. Gabriel and Dieter Kirchner at the printing press Broschuere:Layout 1 16.09.2009 16:31 Uhr Seite 9

G.L. Gabriel, From the series Brandenburg Gate “After the Fall of the Wall”, mixed technique on canvas, 1991 SKIA Photography, 7 copies, 27.05 x 27.17 in. (68,7 x 69 cm), 2009 Broschuere:Layout 1 16.09.2009 16:31 Uhr Seite 10

G.L. Gabriel, From the series “Factory at the Wall”, repainted barite print, Berlin-Kreuzberg, 1987 SKIA Photography, 7 copies, 76.38 x 26.1 in. (194 x 66,3 cm), 2009 Broschuere:Layout 1 16.09.2009 16:31 Uhr Seite 11

G.L. Gabriel, From the series “Factory at the Wall”, repainted barite print, Berlin-Kreuzberg, 1987 SKIA Photography, 7 copies, 70.26 x 25.55 in. (178,45 x 64,9 cm), 2009 Broschuere:Layout 1 16.09.2009 16:32 Uhr Seite 12

G.L. Gabriel, From the series Factory at the Wall “View of the Wall with Watchtower Facing Spree River”, repainted barite print, East Berlin-Osthafen, 1987 Broschuere:Layout 1 16.09.2009 16:32 Uhr Seite 13

SKIA Photography, 7 copies, 76.38 x 26.58 in. (194 x 67,52 cm), 2009 Broschuere:Layout 1 16.09.2009 16:32 Uhr Seite 14

The Precision of Swiftness Works by G.L. Gabriel

The making of. How Gabriel creates her paintings. Color value and pictorial meaning. The coloring of every painting is set to a particular tonal value. Sophisticated unanimity: The prevailing color scheme appears on a scale of all variations. It lends the paintings a wealth of diversity as well as determination and a certain austerity. While the weave of swift strokes is casually fresh, the colors calmly and timelessly define the pictorial character. They are spread thin, wholly irreplaceable. Because they appear washed out and faded into the canvas, they are immutable, at ease with nature and long-lasting. They objectify the image. The mood they convey is not ephemeral; it is perennial. The image takes its tension from the visible swiftness of its creation process and the calm distance emanating from the flowing tonal variations. The method of washing down the freshly painted canvas with a splash of water offsets hard, rough transitions and destroys colo- red micro-structures. The painting runs together to become a harmonious and intense unit over which the painter has only limited control – later corrections can only relate to sections of the painting. The skin of the painting is so thin as to be barely measurable. The canvas appears dyed, the paper is covered flat. Gabriel avoids pastose material outlays. A serene distance lends rigor to her paintings: When the contours and tones of the In search of a city's psyche. paintings are washed out, the same is not at all true for their visual structure; Gabriel paints Berlin's urban landscapes. On first and second glance, her images she gains precision from artwork that is removed from the object. Haziness, a could be those of any comparable city in terms of its topography and illumina- blurring effect, the use of nebulous zones are all artistic means for G.L. Gabriel tion; but for those who are familiar with Berlin, Gabriel's paintings of the city to work pictorially with (and within) the interactions of stroke weaves and are lucid, recognizable. It is incomparable with (and thoroughly dissimilar to) color surfaces, clarity and security. Gray-tiered tones may appear more intense, the Berlin of Werner Heldt, who also did not paint sightseeing attractions but longer-lasting than unshaded ones. captured the nerve of this (destroyed) city – the checkered firewalls, the horizontals The painter was only able to gain the distance conveyed by the paintings of the tarred roll roofing, the endless lines of the window crosses. through her proximity to the objects. This is the Berlin that Gabriel has on/in her images, albeit pictorially different; Repealed colorfulness is independent of time. The paintings receive a long her Berlin is not one of bright summer evenings full of white grief, her Berlin is wind. Through the interplay of color surfaces and non-foreshortened color diffusely precise, infused with a morbidezza that reaches across the ages. Her spaces, Gabriel gains the full abundance of temporal experience and a concrete Berlin is brittle, saturated with life, generations long. The houses in Gabriel's awareness of time. This has a similar effect to the broad-surfaced tension of paintings are able to age – they are brick houses whose proportions and struc- Rothko's paintings, though they were differently conceived. Gabriel abstains ture show dignity even as they decay. The ability to age and to carry wounds from psychological interpretation, rejects explanatory or accusatory gestures – and lesions with dignity sets these houses apart from appended concrete living the mere engagement of objects here and surfaces and colors there ensures that cubicles. Gabriel glorifies nothing. No urban romanticism. Debris and decay are the paintings retain their determined distance to things and to themselves. not immediately visible in the painting; they are more of a conceivable than a Thus, Gabriel's casual paintings define more lived temporal awareness than any tangibly exhibited reality. The streets and houses appear deserted, but the depic- eternity-touting, stone-set totalitarian stamp. ted situations are replete with the history of human experience. Gabriel's urban Many images require photographic templates. Memory aides. Gabriel takes landscapes extend serenely on the two-dimensional plane. photographs – of landscapes, of houses – or she uses the photos of others.

G.L. Gabriel, Philharmonic, mixed technique on paper, 32.7 x 46.5 in. (83 x 118 cm), Berlin, 1993 Collection German Bundestag Broschuere:Layout 1 16.09.2009 16:32 Uhr Seite 15

painting are different for Mienske Janssen, Fred Thieler and G.L. Gabriel; but they share in common the use of breathing, flowing thin color surfaces and the courage to design paintings as counter-images to solemn reality.

The continuity of transience. In her own way, G.L. Gabriel makes use of methods borrowed from Action Painting, or Tachisme. She does so observantly, with circumspect. She has developed her way of seeing things, her handwriting. Her paintings are confident, temporal – without pathos, without false or well-meaning heroics, which are artistically speaking the most embarrassing of all pathetic gestures because they are thoroughly worn out and stale. Gabriel does not assert any claims that are beyond the scope of her paintings. The painter references nothing, she teaches nothing. In her own way, Gabriel renders realities – of people, of landscapes – visible. The remarkable achievement of G.L. Gabriel's paintings: they halt time in a way that unsentimentally coalesces decay and deterioration into the pictorial formula. The paintings live on as casual pictorial witnesses of this era.

Prof. Hermann Wiesler (1932-1999), Professor of Aesthetics and the Sociology of Art, Berlin University of the Arts Kinship. Traditions in Gabriel's paintings. The ability to make art can neither be taught nor inherited. What can be imparted are principles of the craft and comparative standards developed on the basis of other paintings. Talents can be hampered, encouraged – but not cultivated. G.L. Gabriel's parents are painters, distinguished painters developing and repre- senting main chapters of Tachisme. The paintings of Mienske Janssen are spontaneous, temperately vehement color attacks. Vivid, free, unbridled. Memories of water, flower bundles. Fred Thieler is formative and exemplary as a painter. His paintings are testimo- nies and documents to what European painting after 1945 has accomplished, is capable of and is moved by – such examples can attract or alienate. Anything is conceivable... G.L. Gabriel wanted to paint. Her parents' example taught her nothing tangible. Artistic methods cannot be conveniently and convincingly passed along like worn clothing. However, the daughter shares their common attitude – sponta- neity, courage to be headstrong towards oneself and the materials used. She invented her own method. Her path was shorter and, in an artistic and political sense, easier than her father's: the next generation has an immediate command of the life's work of previous generations, can sound it out, variegate and refine it. The old further fortifies its status as a durable material while the new must demonstrate how it autonomously frees itself from its predecessors. This is what G.L. Gabriel did and continues to do. The fascinating thing is how close and yet how far her works are from the paintings she grew up with. The methods of

Gabriel’s former studio in Berlin-Wedding, 1987 G.L. Gabriel, “View Facing East”, mixed technique on muslin, diptych total 78.7 x 118.1 in. (200 x 300 cm), Berlin, 1984, Collection Berlin Museum Broschuere:Layout 1 16.09.2009 16:32 Uhr Seite 16

G.L. Gabriel, “Stairway Neues Museum 2007”, 21.3 x 28.5 in. (54 x 72.5 cm), mixed technique on paper, Berlin, 2007 Broschuere_seite17+20:Broschuere_seite17+20 16.09.2009 16:38 Uhr Seite 1

G.L. Gabriel, “Stairway Neues Museum 1945”, 21.3 x 28.6 in. (54.2 x 72.6 cm), mixed technique on paper, Berlin, 2007 Broschuere_seite18+19:Broschuere_seite18+19 16.09.2009 16:37 Uhr Seite 1

G.L. Gabriel, “Stairway Neues Museum before 1945”, 21.1 x 28.9 in. (53.5 x 73.5 cm), mixed technique on paper, Berlin, 2007 Broschuere_seite18+19:Broschuere_seite18+19 16.09.2009 16:37 Uhr Seite 2

Without words. A triptych.

Background. Hundreds of people are standing in line along the bank of the turned into an empty hall with a completely new ramp-like stairway leading to Spree river in Berlin's Mitte district. Spring is still long in coming on this March its central point, which is crowned with the bust of Nefertiti. 6, 2009, and the line extends a third of a mile to the Berliner Dom, but these people are determined to visit the Neue Museum on the Museumsinsel. Today is The Triptych. G.L. Gabriel knows the history of the building. She tries to glean open house—the official opening isn't until October 16. something universal from it, a change of perspective. The building has been closed to the public for 70 years. It was first shut down in She would often visit the museum, alone, drawing sketches. She is interested in 1939 under the imminent threat of war, along with all other museums on the the magic of the place, both spacial and temporal, divided into three time spans island, and in 1945 was half destroyed by war hostilities. on the triptych. All three images show the same staircase in the museum, yet the The destruction of this museum also symbolized the downfall of civilization: events of world history raged here and turned it into three vastly different states Finished in 1855 by Friedrich-August Stüler, the museum was the epitome of of existence. Every image conveys a world of its own—emotional spaces, soul educational and antique museums, using the interplay of artistic crafts and spaces. This results in questions for the observer: In which state do I like the architecture to create an educational showcase of its scenery. Sumptuous fres- building most? Why did the people who live here need 65 years to rebuild this coes and elaborate stucco along the walls and ceilings formed the basis for an stairway? individual backdrop to every area of the museum: the Egyptian section with the G.L. Gabriel leaves these questions open-ended, allowing observers to reach sculpture of Nefertiti, the Greek and Nordic sections, works of art from the their own intellectual and emotional conclusions. Her drawings establish a Middle Ages and a cabinet of copper engravings. dialog, one that ignores the boundaries of time. The triptych connects the The central hallway shown here, with its enormous dimensions — 125 feet (38 sentiments felt at different times in this place. meters) long, 52 feet (15 m) wide and 66 feet (20 m) tall — featured a complicated It is with this mental roundelay, her own view of civilization, that G.L. Gabriel ramp-like staircase crowned with caryatids, copies from the Porch of the Maidens approaches the observer. It is a curiously idiosyncratic take on Kaulbach's (Caryatid Porch) in the Erechtheum of Athens. In terms of its size and signifi- “History of Humanity”, a trilogy on hope—war—freedom. There is no accusation, cance — even the idea of using a stairwell at once as a ballroom, temple and just emotion, perhaps wistfulness, perhaps hope in a blue sky, and hope in the exhibition hall — it was one of a kind worldwide. new ballroom for those who care to discover it. The upper floor of the hallway was dominated by 246-foot-long (75 m) wall frescoes “on the history of humanity” (“zur Geschichte der Menschheit”) by the court painter Wilhelm von Kaulbach. The themes: The Tower of Babylon, Homer Christian Pricelius and the Greeks, The Destruction of Jerusalem, The Battle of the Huns, The Crusaders publicist in Berlin of Jerusalem and The Age of Reformation. The great interest among the public today says a lot about Berlin's enthusiasm for architecture and its willingness to engage radically new ideas. The British architect David Chipperfield won the 1997 architecture contest to rebuild the Neue Museum with his plan for a critical reconstruction. He preserved ruined frescoes and columns, cautiously spreading a neutral plaster over the gaps. In spaces that were completely lost, including the north wing and stairwell, he created new work within the given structures. Wittingly or not, he spawned a distinct form of genuine, authentic ruin romanticism, originating from the destroyed remnants of an intact classical assembly and the necessary neutral supplements. Chipperfield did not want a heroic copy, no architectural lies that would deny the tragedy and shock of events; but he also sought to avoid its opposite, pure empty provocation. A point of the finger at history. The stairwell is Broschuere_seite17+20:Broschuere_seite17+20 16.09.2009 16:38 Uhr Seite 2

The message To say that G.L. Gabriel is a Berlin painter is almost like saying nothing at all. led by the USSR's Perestroika, Moscow's renunciation of the previous rule and For she is the painter of and for Berlin. The Berlin wall, represented here by power politics... the Brandenburg Gate, was undoubtedly a tragedy for several generations of G.L. Gabriel conveys a message to us through her artwork, which is so compel- Germans. ling that it is inescapable. The fall of the wall, absolutely indispensable to the future of Europe, was enab- Igor Fjodorowitsch Maximytschew

G.L. Gabriel, “Soviet Memorial at the Brandenburg Gate”, mixed technique on canvas, 59.1 x 114.2 in. (150 x 290 cm), Berlin, 1995 Broschuere:Layout 1 16.09.2009 16:32 Uhr Seite 21

G.L. Gabriel, “American Embassy at the Brandenburg Gate”, mixed technique on paper, 29.7 x 41.9 in. (75.5 x 106.5 cm), Berlin, 2009 Broschuere:Layout 1 16.09.2009 16:32 Uhr Seite 22

Reflections Upon Reflections Norman Foster; the Brandenburg Gate with the American embassy; and the The new paintings by Gaby Gabriel show architectures in Berlin: the Neue Mu- "unbuilding" of the Palace of the Republic. Gaby Gabriel's paintings assert the seum by Stüler and Chipperfield; the Reichstag after the renovation by Paul greatest measure of freedom. Baumgarten, and yes, after Christo's veiling but before the reconstruction by Sir The author Michael S. Cullen is a publicist and historian in Berlin.

G.L. Gabriel, “Demolition Ruin Palace of the Republic of the GDR in East Berlin”, mixed technique on paper, diptych total 59.1 x 42.9 in. (150 x 109 cm), Berlin, 2008 Broschuere:Layout 1 16.09.2009 16:32 Uhr Seite 23

G.L. Gabriel, “View of the Reichstag from the Moltke Bridge”, mixed technique on canvas, 63 x 86.6 in. (160 x 220 cm), Berlin, 1996 SKIA Photography, 7 copies, 36.42 x 27.05 in. (92,5 x 68,7 cm), 2009 Broschuere:Layout 1 16.09.2009 16:32 Uhr Seite 24

G.L. Gabriel, From the series Factory at the Wall “View of the East Harbor” repainted barite print, East Berlin, 1987 SKIA Photography, 7 copies, 74.98 x 27.05 in. (190,45 x 68,7 cm), 2009 Broschuere:Layout 1 16.09.2009 16:32 Uhr Seite 25

My works from the series "Factory at the Wall" symbolize to me the interrelation of East and West Berlin. G.L. Gabriel Broschuere:Layout 1 16.09.2009 16:33 Uhr Seite 26

The torso of the Palace of the Republic is seen from across an immaterial band ture with which the ideologically most visible piece of GDR-history disappears – the Spree river – creating a sense of distance. G.L. Gabriel chose the form of a from the cityscape. diptych in order to capture the demolition of this remarkable building, a struc- Dr. Kurt Winkler is Director of the House of Brandenburg-Prussian History.

G.L. Gabriel, “Demolition Ruin Palace of the Republic of the GDR in East Berlin at the Spree River”, Berlin, 2008 Tableau 70.9 x 108.1 in. (180 x 274.5 cm) Broschuere:Layout 1 16.09.2009 16:33 Uhr Seite 27

Mixed technique on canvas, sand, iron-oxide pigment collage, diptych total 70.9 x 218.5 in. (180 x 555 cm) Tableau 70.9 x 110.4 in. (180 x 280.5 cm) Broschuere:Layout 1 16.09.2009 16:58 Uhr Seite 28

Biography & Exhibitions (selection) 1989 „Neue Generation aus Berlin“, Contemporary Art Center, Osaka, Japan Berlinische Galerie, Berlin G.L. Gabriel 1990 Jeroch Gallery, Hannover 1958 Born in Munich as Gabriele Lina Henriette Thieler Ursula Wiedenkeller Gallery, Zurich Grahsey Gallery, Constance 1959 Family moves to Berlin Berlinische Galerie, hosted at the Museum of Modern Art, Berlin

1976 – 81 Master Scholar degree in painting, Berlin University of the Arts (UdK) 1991 „Das Brandenburger Tor“, Berlin Museum, Berlin „BERLIN! The Berlinische Gallerie Arts Collection visits Dublin“, 1978 First workshop in Berlin-Tiergarten Hugh Lane Minicipal Gallery of Modern Art, Dublin

1979 Moritzplatz Gallery, Berlin 1992 Eva Poll Gallery, Berlin Grashey Gallery, Constance 1980 Moritzplatz Gallery, Berlin 1993 „Hans Scharoun“, Academy of the Arts, Berlin 1981 Eva Poll Gallery, Berlin Deutsche Oper, Frankfurt/Main 1994 – 99 Member of the jury, „Fred Thieler Prize“ for painting Gmyrek Gallery, Düsseldorf Galerie d'Art Contemporain des Musées de Nice, Nice 1994 Ursula Wiedenkeller Gallery, Zurich Fassbender Fine Arts, Chicago 1982 Galerie Altos de Chavon, Santo Domingo Schüler Gallery, Berlin Kulturhuset, Stockholm / Kunstverein München, Munich Eva Poll Gallery, Berlin 1995 National Art Gallery, Berlin (Neue Nationalgalerie) „Flora – Fauna“, Ursula Wiedenkeller Gallery, Zurich 1983 Solo stand for Eva Poll Gallery at „Art Cologne“, Cologne „Frauen an der Akademie – Künstlerinnen zwischen Hochschule und Öffentlichkeit“, 1996 Ursula Wiedenkeller Gallery, Zurich GEDOK Art Forum, Hamburg „Stadt“, Raab Gallery, Berlin „Malereien“, Gallery at the Kutscherhaus, Berlin „Amsterdam-Berlin / Berlin-Amsterdam“, Het Centrum vrouwen in de beeldende Kunst, Amsterdam 1997 Pro Arte Gallery, Freiburg

1984 Eva Poll Gallery, Berlin 1998 Solo exhibitions at Goethe Institute in Damascus, Porto and Lissabon Galerie A., Brussels „Fred Thieler – Mienske Janssen – G.L. Gabriel“, exhibition, „Cross-Section“, Goethe Institute, London / Art Space, Aberdeen introduction by Manfred de la Motte, Galerie Bremer, Berlin „Positionen Berlin“, Women's Museum, Bonn „Newer Expressions – The Germans“, Marianne Deson Gallery, Chicago 1999 Ursula Wiedenkeller Gallery, Zurich „Ausgewählt“ (works on paper from the collection of the German Bundestag), 1985 „Landschaft Berlin“, Grundkreditbank Arts Forum, Berlin Art and Exhibition Hall of the Federal Republic of Germany, Bonn „Once artistas de Berlin“, Centro Cultural, Madrid Raab Gallery, Berlin „Moritzplatz – Aus der Werkstatt der Heftigen Malerei“, Art Space Bonn / Art Space Hamburg „Kunst Berlin 1985“, Peat Marwick, Frankfurt/Main 2001 Ursula Wiedenkeller Gallery, Zurich „Arts Prize Junger Westen“, Kunsthalle, Recklinghausen Herbert Jacob Weinand Gallery, Berlin 2002 Ursula Wiedenkeller Gallery, Zurich

1986 First solo exhibition in Zurich 2003 Exhibition at GASAG, Berlin Von Loeper Gallery, Hamburg Ursula Wiedenkeller Gallery, Zurich 2004 Artwork at the Berlin Parliament Schering Arts Club, Berlin (design of Assembly Hall with three large-format urban landscapes) „Images of Shakespeare“, Arts Forum, Berlin Ursula Wiedenkeller Gallery, Zurich „Mythos Beethoven“, Hennemann Gallery, Bonn (9th International Biennial) Exhibition CMS Berlin – with Fred Thieler, K.H. Hödicke et al. „Berliner Stadtlandschaften“, Vienna / Amsterdam / London / Zurich 2005 Schoen Nalepa Gallery, Berlin 1987 „Berliner Stadtlandschaften“ for Berlin's 750th anniversary celebrations Exhibition University of the Arts (UdK) – with K.H. Hödicke et al. Study tour in Japan, Goethe House New York List Gallery, Hannover 2006 „Berlin im Bild – Malerei seit 1945“, Berlin Museum, Berlin „New York in the eyes of Berlin artists“, Goethe House, New York Kunsthaus, Potsdam „Art LA“, Los Angeles List Gallery, Hannover 2007 Ursula Wiedenkeller Gallery, Zurich

1988 First solo exhibition in Paris 2008 Exhibition at the office of Dr. Melcop and Academy of Education, Berlin Trip to Chile with working stay in the Atacama Desert Cramer and Schierner Gallery, Bonn 2009 G. L . Gabriel „Berlin at the wall”, Dietz Space, New York Ursula Wiedenkeller Gallery, Zurich „Kunst für Europa – Deutsche Kunst Heute“, Institute for Foreign Cultural Relations (ifa) G.L. Gabriel lives and works in Berlin. Broschuere:Layout 1 16.09.2009 16:58 Uhr Seite 29

G. L. Gabriel

Berlin at the wall Published on the occasion of the exhibition at Dietzspace gallery N.Y., N.Y. from 6 October 2009 to 5 January 2010

Edited in Berlin 2009

Concept by G.L. Gabriel and Ulrich Rossol Production coordination DruckConcept, Berlin Lithography NovaConcept, Berlin

www.glgabriel.de www.dietzspace.org

Cover: G.L. Gabriel From the series Factory at the Wall “View of the Wall with Watchtower Facing Spree River” East Berlin-Osthafen, 1987 Broschuere:Layout 1 16.09.2009 17:13 Uhr Seite 30