Michael Riedel Graphic Art as Event

Alongside examples of his current work, the exhibition did highlight the Signetic Drawing (1994–95), a spectacular early work by the Frankfurt-based artist that was on view in its entirety for the first time.
It was purchased in 2016 by the Städelscher Museums-Verein e.V. Executed at an early stage in his career, the group of over a thousand sheets already manifests Riedel’s artistic approach, which accords the graphic work the status of a self-sufficient artwork.

Riedel’s concept of process, in terms of the aesthetics of production, is based on conditions of endless possible continuations. It also prompts associations with the roughly contemporaneous book by Niklas Luhmann, Art as a Social System, which formulates the breakdown of the boundary between a work and the description of a work, presaging a form of art production that thus becomes autonomous. The provocative question arises as to the role of the artist in the realm of reproductive intelligences and meandering information structures that permeates Riedel’s printmaking oeuvre in medially expansive manner.

Curator: Dr Eva Linhart