Keith Sonnier

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Keith Sonnier (* 1941 in Mamou , Louisiana ; † July 18, 2020 in Southampton , New York ) was an American painter and sculptor who became known for his light installations .

life and work

Sonnier graduated from the University of Southwestern Louisiana at Lafayette with a bachelor's degree in art and anthropology in 1963. Then he went to Paris, where he painted. He returned to the United States, received his master's degree from Rutgers University in New Brunswick in 1966 and moved to New York . Since the late 1960s, he has included neon tubes and glass , but also other materials such as fiberglass, lead, grease, latex, wire and aluminum, in his work, expanding the conventional concept of sculpture together with Dan Flavin , James Turrell and Richard Serra . However, he subsequently set himself apart from the radical formal language of the minimalists. As early as 1968 he had his first solo exhibition in the Ricke Gallery in Cologne, in 1969 he was represented in Harald Szeemann's legendary exhibition When attitudes become form. Live in your head in the Kunsthalle Bern . One of his early neon objects Ba-o-ba # 3 , Neon with Transformer and Glass, 230 × 311, 60 cm, is in the collection of the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York. Since 1970 he has incorporated film and video art into his work.

In 1999, during the retrospective “Environmental Works 1968–1999” , he transformed the Kunsthaus in Bregenz into a highly visible art object with a colored facade installation. One of Sonnier's most spectacular works in Europe is the more than 1.2 kilometer long neon artwork Lichtweg on connecting level 03 of Terminal 1 at Munich Airport . Due to the constantly changing light colors, the level appears as an experience space. Another work in public space in Munich is Passage Rot Blau between Angerhof and the Jewish Community on St.-Jakobs-Platz.

Sonnier took part in Szeemann's Documenta 5 in 1971 , as well as in the Venice Biennale and in 1977 in Documenta 7 in Kassel . The artist lived and worked in New York.

Solo exhibitions (selection)

  • 2019 April - October Schloss Derneburg / Hall Art Foundation
  • 2008 Häusler Contemporary, Zurich: Keith Sonnier. Shelf Works 1975
  • 2002 New National Gallery , Berlin: Ba – o – Ba Berlin
  • 2001 Overbeck-Gesellschaft Lübeck: Drawings and neon works
  • 1999 Kunsthaus Bregenz, Bregenz: Environmental Works 1968-1999 ; Marlborough Gallery, New York: Sculpture 1966-1998
  • 1989 National Gallery, Washington, DC: Keith Sonnier: Neon ; Municipal Museum Abteiberg, Mönchengladbach: Exp anded File Series: 1969-1989
  • 1981 Portland Center for the Visual Arts, Portland
  • 1979 Museum Haus Lange, Krefeld: BA-o-BA Sel Series
  • 1971 Museum of Modern Art, New York: Projects: Keith Sonnier
  • 1970 Leo Castelli Gallery, New York (regularly thereafter); Stedelijk van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven
  • 1968 Galerie Rolf Ricke : Keith Sonnie r (also 1971, 1978, 1981, 1987)

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Sculptor Keith Sonnier is dead , wdr.de, July 21, 2020
  2. ↑ monopoly. Magazine for Art and Life from July 21, 2020: Pioneer of light art. Artist Keith Sonnier dies at the age of 78 , accessed on July 22, 2020
  3. ↑ Ruhrberg, Schneckenburger et al.: Art of the 20th Century , Taschen, 1998, p. 811, ISBN 3-8228-8802-8
  4. ^ Website of the Kunsthaus Bregenz
  5. ↑ Munich Airport: Lichtweg ( Memento from March 4, 2016 in the Internet Archive )
personal data
SURNAME Sonnier, Keith
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American object artist
DATE OF BIRTH 1941
PLACE OF BIRTH Mamou , Louisiana
DATE OF DEATH 18th July 2020
Place of death Southampton , New York