Martin Kippenberger

Martin Kippenberger was born in 1953 in Dortmund. In his pictures, installations, performances, sculptures and photographs the artist dealt with social and political issues. Among his artistic strategies were deliberate breaches of style, provocation and irony. Kippenberger was one of Germany’s so-called Neue Wilde. After studying art for four years under Franz-Erhard Walther and Arnold Hauser, he discontinued his studies in 1976. In 1978, with the gallerist Gisela Capitain, he founded the Kippenberger Office in Berlin, where he exhibited the work of young artists. In 1990 he held a guest professorship at the Städelschule in Frankfurt. Together with the Museum of Modern Art he opened his own museum on the Greek island Syros in 1993. Kippenberger participated in documenta 10 in 1997. In 1999 and 2003 he was represented posthumously at the 48th and 50th Venice Biennales. Important national and international collections own his work, among them the Städel Museum in Frankfurt, the Museum Ludwig in Cologne and the Museum of Modern Art in New York. He died in Vienna in 1997.