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MANFRED PERNICE, 2B Dosenwelt, 2016, Kunstmuseum St. Gallen, St. Gallen, Switzerland; Courtesy: Kunstmuseum St. Gallen; © Kunstmuseum St. Gallen

Manfred Pernice

born 1963 in Hildesheim, Germany

lives and works in Berlin

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Manfred Pernice studied from 1984 to 1987 graphics and painting at the Braunschweig University of Art, from 1988 to 1994 sculpture at the Berlin University of the Arts.

From 2004 to 2009 he was a professor at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna, in 2012 he became a professor for sculpture at the University of Fine Arts in Berlin.

Manfred Pernice's sculptures – primarily boxes and containers with cylindrical or cuboid shapes implying a “canned world” – have in recent years become more prismatic, plastic positions. The chipboard, plywood, tile, iron and concrete used in these sculptures are materials primarily associated with handicraft, but when combined with texts, drawings, newspaper clippings, photocopies, everyday objects (sometimes found) and other things, these structures create an open system of references that tap into specific socio-cultural codes, memories, or things that have meaning for a certain site. Manfred Pernice’s working methods, which have been described as “blurring” and “direction finding,” are practiced with deliberation. Direction finding means capturing a moment within a kind of order that openly gives in, powerless, to the world’s complexity – an order that could just as soon produce alternative contexts. Pernice’s direction finding locates history telling, sorting, separating, and preserving – also of minor or discarded things – and creates a poetic network of mutual references.

Manfred Pernice was represented in 2001 and 2003 at the Venice Biennale, in 2002 at the Documenta XI in Kassel. Since 2007 his works have been regularly exposed at the KölnSkulptur. He participated at the Bienal de São Paulo (2011), the Skulptur Projekte Münster (2007), the Bienal de Sevilla (2006), the Manifesta 3, Ljubljana (2002), the Berlin Biennale (1998), and the Biennale de Lyon (1997).

Selected solo exhibitions: LLS Paleis, Antwerpen (2021); Kunstfenster des Kulturkreis der deutschen Wirtschaft im BDI e.V., Haus der Deutschen Wirtschaft, Berlin (2017); Kunstmuseum St. Gallen (2016); Lulu, Mexico City (2016); Institut d'Art Contemporain Villeurbanne (2013); Haus der Kunst, Munich (2013); S.M.A.K., Ghent (2011); n.b.k. Neuer Berliner Kunstverein (2011); DCA Dundee Contemporary Arts, Dundee (2011); Secession, Vienna (2010); Modern Art Oxford (2010); Salzburger Kunstverein (2010); Neues Museum, Nuremberg (2008); Museum Ludwig, Cologne (2008); Pinakothek der Moderne, Munich (2003); Sprengel Museum, Hanover (2001); Portikus, Frankfurt/Main (2000); Kunsthalle Zürich, Zurich (2000); Kabinett für aktuelle Kunst, Bremerhaven (1997).

Selected museum collections: MoMA Museum of Modern Art, New York; Solomon R. Guggenheim Collection, New York; S.M.A.K., Ghent; Pinakothek der Moderne, Munich; Kunstmuseum Liechtenstein, Vaduz; and Tate Modern, London.

Selected Works

Manfred Pernice

o.T., 2010

wood, paint, metal, rotoring motor; lying on:1 radio (Strehla konkret RR1401), 1 boombox (Super Woofer BESTAR RR5700), 10 various cardboard boxes, 7 various plastic boxes, 1 bottle Calvados, 1 puzzle (1000 parts, motif: breakfast board), 1 dollhouse corner bench, waiting game, Strom - Energie mit der wir leben, 1 package hinges, piece of wood; hanging: Rubik's Cube keyring, bottle opener, mouth trap, 5 keyrings, 4 angular, tag Air Berlin, yellow string

164 x 246 cm (65 x 97 in.)

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