Gregor Hildebrandt

Gregor Hildebrandt (born 1974 in Bad Homburg, West Germany) is a German contemporary artist who lives and works in Berlin, Germany
Early life and education
Gregor Hildebrandt graduated from Hochschule der Künste, Berlin, in 2002, after he studied previously at the University of Mainz between 1995 and 1999. Hildebrandt was awarded a Studienstiftung scholarship between 1998 and 2002 and received a scholarship at the Deutsches Studienzentrum in Venice the following year, while still a student. Today, he lives in Berlin with fellow artist Alicja Kwade.
Work
In his artistic practice, Gregor Hildebrandt makes extensive use of pre-recorded cassette tapes as material in his pictures and installations. The tapes are applied directly onto canvases and photographic prints and in room-sized installations. In his paintings, he adheres the coated side of cassette tapes onto a canvas, presses on it with a brush or roller, and rips the tape off to create the defined, yet sporadic lines on his works. He repeats the process before finally gluing them onto the canvas for good to create what he calls the “negative” painting. For sculptures, he shapes vinyl records into bowls, sometimes stacking them to create what the artist calls a “sonic wall made of pillars of records.”
Hildebrandt started thinking about incorporating audio into his practice during his time at the University of the Arts in Berlin. In the late 1990s, the artist recorded 'Falschgeld' by German experimental group Einstürzende Neubauten before cutting the magnetic tape out and pasting it into his sketchbook. Hildebrandt's signature canvases known for its magnetic tape covering were developed in the 2000s, gradually increasing in size to take on architectural dimensions. The 2021 large-scale installation Hirnholzparkett (2015), shown at G2 Kunsthalle in Leipzig, incorporated 35,000 audiocassette tapes into record-sized reels, cast into epoxy resin and layered across the floor.
Although Hildebrandt's work makes formal reference to Minimalism, the addition of a great number of subjective and autobiographical citations actually deliberately repudiates this strategy. For Hildebrandt, the cassette tape as artistic medium, especially in its original function of storage medium, fulfils an important function: it enables the artist to add a further “invisible” dimension to his pictures. Playing with perception in this way is a major characteristic of his work; the picture is completed in the head of the viewer.
If the contemplation of his art incorporates the heterogeneous cosmos of Gregor Hildebrandt's references to music, film, literature and, last but not least, art history, his works turn out to be complex montages, in which pictorial associations from different spheres combine and interpenetrate. Hildebrandt employs the material of his every-day environment without aesthetic or theoretical inhibition and playfully links aspects of conceptual art and minimal art with his personal life and experience of pop culture.
Gregor Hildebrandt is represented by Wentrup in Berlin, Grimm Gallery in Amsterdam, Almine Rech Gallery in Paris, Brussels and London and Emmanuel Perrotin in New York. and Casado Santapau gallery at Madrid.
Selected solo exhibitions
2012
Nächtliches Konzert, Museum Van Bommel van Dam with Jorinde Voigt, Venlo, Netherlands
Eind Koffer aus Berlin, Saarländisches Künstlerhaus, Saarbrücken
Schlaf is Zeit, die dir gehört, AVLSKARL, Copenhagen
2011
FÜR KOMMENDE MORGEN, Wentrup, Berlin
Seiten im Buch wie Wände im Raum, Almine Rech Gallery, Paris
Und dass zu frühe die Parze den Traum nicht ende, Grimm Gallery, Amsterdam
2010
vor der Tür stehen weiße Pferde, Galerie Almine Rech, Brussels
die Nacht trägt den Plan, Van Horn, Düsseldorf
Shapeless in the Dark again, Sommer Contemporary, Tel Aviv
2009
Weiße Nacht hängt an den Bergen, GriederContemporary, Zurich
Daß dieser Mai nie ende, Wentrup, Berlin
Der Himmel im Raum, Berlinische Galerie, Berlin (cat.)
2008
This was made to end all parties, Ursula Werz, Tübingen
Front Room, Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis, St. Louis
Hokuspokus, Kunstverein Schwerte, Schwerte
Statement, Art 39 Basel (with Galerie Jan Wentrup)
und im Garten blüht ein Blumenbeet, Haus am Waldsee, Berlin
2007
Dunkle Fahrt zu hellem Tag, Kunstverein Ludwigshafen
Dunkle Fahrt zu hellem Tag, Galerie Jan Wentrup, Berlin
Zum Wohl der Tränen, Almine Rech Gallery, Paris
2006
B:1F-134, Uberbau, Düsseldorf with Alicja Kwade
2005
Von den Steinen zu den Sternen, Galerie Jan Wentrup, Berlin
Tage und Stunden zerspringen vor Glück, Städtische Galerie Pankow, Berlin
2004
allnightlong, Kaiserpassage 21a, Karlsruhe (with Jenny Rosemeyer)
Und dieses Wasser wird sich immer schwarz färben, Arsenal HKM1, Raum für Kunst, Mainz
2003
Dunst blauer Tage, Kunstverein Eislingen (cat.)
Hausmusik, Mt. Warning, Berlin
Black Flags under the Yellow Moon, Hinterconti, Hamburg (with Carola Deye)
2002
Tönende Jugend, WBD, Berlin
Public collections
Centre Pompidou / Paris, F
Berlinische Galerie / Berlin, D
Sammlung zeitgenössische Kunst des Bundes, D
Sammlung Museum van Bommel van Dam/ Venlo, NL
Selected notable private collections
Martin Z. Margulies Collection / Miami, US
Rubell Family Collection, US
Collection Jill & Peter Kraus /New York, US
Pat and Juan Vergez Collection/ Buenos Aires, AR
Sammlung Südhausbau / München, D
Collection Robert and Renée Drake / Wassenaar, NL
Sammlung Philara /Düsseldorf, D
sammlung FIEDE /Aschaffenburg, D
Collection Steve and Chiara Rosenblum / Paris, F
Burger Collection / Zürich / Hong Kong, CH / HK
Awards and scholarships
2008 - Vattenfall Kunstpreis „Energie“
2008 - Stiftung Kunstfonds
2005 / 2006 - Scholarship, DAAD, Vienna
2004 - Award, GASAG
2003 - Scholarship, Deutsches Studienzentrum Venedig
1998 / 2002 - Scholarship, Studienstiftung des deutschen Volkes
Bibliography
Gregor Hildebrandt: Tönend hallt die Jugend, Kunsthalle Recklinghausen, DE/EN,
References
External links
Gregor Hildenbrandt Artist Page at Sommer Contemporary Art Gallery Website
1974 births
Living people
German artists
German contemporary artists