Michael Beutler, central avenue, 2005, Installation view, Bonner Kunstverein / Neue Kunsthalle St Gallen Courtesy Galerie Michael Neff
Michael Beutler’s expansive sculptures are usually created on-site in relation to given architectural arrangements. In an idiosyncratic experimental process Beutler employs conventional building materials to question standardization, using DIY strategies and creating machines that facilitate the construction of the piece.
At Frieze Art Fair 2005 Beutler presented next to center (2005), a site-specific sculptural installation that responded to the ordered formality of the fair’s internal grid. Beutler constructed a social space that made use of lo-fi resources found in and around the fair environs. Treating the peculiar architectural conditions of the fair as his own workshop, Beutler explored alternative ways of inhabiting this very particular landscape, resulting in a playful interrogation of form and function, private and public space.
Michael Beutler was born in Oldenburg in 1976; he lives and works in Berlin. Since graduating from the Städelschule, Frankfurt am Main, in 2001 Beutler has established a prolific history of exhibitions - most recently participating in the Gotebörg Biennal; ‘The Bench’ at the Bonner Kunstverein / Kunsthalle St Gallen and the Moscow Biennal (all 2005). Beutler has had solo shows at Frankfurt Kunstverein (2004); Kunstvereins Oldenburg / Heilbronn / Braunschweig / Solothurn (2004) and Vienna Secession (2002). This will be Beutler’s first presentation of a major public work in the UK.
