20th June – 3rd August Private view on Wednesday 19th June 6 – 8.30pm Hannah Barry Gallery, 110 New Bond St W1S 1EB
About The Artist
Marcus Kleinfeld (b. Berlin 1979) is interested in systems of power, both political and psychological, and how such systems govern the landscape of our everyday environment in an increasingly globalised world. Through his paintings, drawings, installations, collages and sculptures, Kleinfeld encourages a reconsideration of the world around us and the objects within it. He seeks to reconnect us with our surroundings by singling out objects and presenting them stripped of their contextualising environment, denuded of utility. The effect can be disconcerting and confrontational, challenging the viewer to reconsider her attitudes to the proliferation of images and symbols in the twenty-first century.
The sculptures and images exhibited here critique the insidious means by which systems of power, hierarchy, wealth, greed and oppression persist. The subjection of the human figure to industrial processes in these works emphasises the depersonalising nature of the structures by which contemporary society is ordered. Yet this apparently fatalistic, critical stance is mitigated by the artist’s sensitivity to, and empathy for, individual desires, ambitions and fears, a faith in interpersonal relations and collective action, the necessity of hope and the possibility of redemption.
