Stefan à Wengen
My Captive Heart
9th November until 21st December 2013
Beck & Eggeling is proud to present the first exhibition of works by the artist Stefan à Wengen in a solo show at their premises at Bilker Strasse 5 in Dusseldorf. The exhibition will be on display from 9th November until 21st December 2013. An artist talk with Christoph Lichtin, former curator of the Museum of Art Lucerne and director of the Historical Museum of Nature Lucerne will take place on 12th December, at 7 pm.
The works of Stefan à Wengen deal with the phenomenon of the uncanny. Deserted landscapes, portraits of animals and people as well as figurative motifs evoke associations with strangeness, the Other, anxiety, melancholy, and other topics that are examined by depth psychology. The paintings and drawings inspire in the viewer memories of images from art history and film, and play with the concepts of the subconscious and questions of cultural codes.
The exhibition My Captive Heart includes approximately 20 drawings from the last ten years. These range from intimate, small pieces to a monumental drawing measuring 180 x 260 cm, entitled The Power of Love. This portrait of a rhinoceros belongs to a whole series of animal portraits in which à Wengen examines animality and finds amazingly human traits.
Stefan à Wengen was born in 1964 in Basel, Switzerland. In 2011/12, he lectured at the Haute Ecole d'Art et Design in Geneva. Today, the artist lives and works in Dusseldorf, where he co-founded the Project Space SPAM-CONTEMPORARY in 2013.
Stefan à Wengen's works have been shown in numerous international exhibitions, such as the important solo exhibition at the Museum of Art Lucerne as well as group exhibitions at the Musée des Beaux Arts, La Chaux-de-Fonds, Switzerland and the Museum Kunstpalast in Dusseldorf. His works can be found in major public and private collections in Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, the USA and Switzerland, among others in the Museum of Art Basel and the Museum of Art Lucerne.