Pall Mall
St. James's, London SW1Y 5LU
UK
In the wake of the Swiss artist’s first major US retrospective, which was curated by Morgan and took place at both sites of MOCA in Los Angeles, the pair will discuss the exhibition and the artist’s practice.
Urs Fischer’s large-scale installations and sculptures posit genres traditionally evoked in painting—such as portraits, landscapes, nudes, and still lifes—in a profusion of rich and often impermanent sculptural materials. Whether utilizing foodstuffs (Bread House, 2004) or more self-destructive mediums, such as soft wax that simply melts away, Fischer mines the endless possibilities of a particular material to introduce an additional dimension into the work: that of time. Imbued with their own mortality, his sculptures and installations cultivate the experiential function of art. Fischer incorporates elements of performance and Pop art to create an oeuvre that is distinctly current, and as witty as it is macabre.
His work is included in many important public and private collections worldwide. Recent major exhibitions include “Kir Royal,” Kunsthaus Zurich (2004); Not My House Not My Fire, Espace 315, Centre Pompidou, Paris (2004); Mary Poppins, Blaffer Gallery, Art Museum of the University of Houston, Texas (2006); Marguerite de Ponty, New Museum, New York (2009–10); Oscar the Grouch, The Brant Foundation, Greenwich, Connecticut (2010–11); Skinny Sunrise, Kunsthalle Wien, Vienna (2012); and Madame Fisscher, Palazzo Grassi, Venice (2012), as well as the Biennale di Venezia in 2003, 2007, and 2011. He lives and works in New York.
Jessica Morgan is the Daskalopoulos Curator, International Art at Tate Modern. Morgan has also recently been appointed Artistic Director of the 10th Gwangju Biennale 2014. Prior to Tate, she was previously Chief Curator at the Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, where she organized exhibitions of work by, among others, Ellen Gallagher, Olafur Eliasson, and Cornelia Parker. Prior to that she was an Assistant Curator at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, where she curated the survey of Mona Hatoum. She has published and lectured extensively on contemporary art and is a regular contributor to art journals including Parkett and Artforum. She holds an MA in Art History from the Courtauld Institute of Art, London and a BA and MA in Art History from Cambridge University. She was a Mellon Fellow at the Yale Centre for British Art, Yale University and a Contemporary Art Curatorial Fellow at The Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University.