Monika Goetz: The Beauty of Unusable Space

February 24 - March 22, 2016

Berlin-based artist Monika Goetz creates videos and site-responsive installations that have been described by critic Annika Karpowski as referring "to spaces that are not graspable, that lie physically above us or exist only in our imagination." Although the artist typically visits a place in advance of developing a project, she has planned this exhibition for University Galleries' window gallery from afar through studying diagrams, looking at photographs, and having conversations. After hearing a curator describe the four-foot area between the gallery's 16-foot high sheetrock walls and the ceiling as "unusable space" (due to its thick coating of insulation and network of pipes and lighting fixtures), Goetz started to question what determines the quality of an interior space, why certain areas are perceived as uninteresting even though they are functionally necessary, and how she could change one's awareness of the room. She has decided to photographically investigate the ceiling and surrounding walls. The artist hopes that the resulting installation of images created on-site will "challenge the perception of our surroundings and question how we judge and evaluate our environment" with an ultimate goal of "uncovering the beauty of this unusable space."

Goetz is a resident in the School of Art's Visiting Artist Program from February 14 - March 4. While on campus, she will teach a weekly seminar, conduct studio visits with students, present a public lecture, and install her exhibition. The Visiting Artist Program was founded in 1996 "to bring diverse artistic practices and fresh voices to the School of Art."

Goetz's work has been exhibited at MASS MoCA, North Adams, Massachusetts; Queens Museum of Art, Queens, New York; Socrates Sculpture Park, Long Island City, New York; MoMA P.S.1, Long Island City, New York; Kunstverein Tiergarten, Berlin; Kunstverein, Kassel, Germany; L.A.C.E., Los Angeles; and in the Gwangju Biennale, Gwangju, South Korea. Her work is in the collections of the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, New York; Museo de Arte y Diseo Contemporneo, San Jose, Costa Rica; Kunstverein Tiergarten / Galerie Nord, Berlin; and Fiduciary Trust Company International, New York, among others. She has been awarded grants and residencies by the School of Visual Arts, New York; the MacDowell Colony, Peterborough, New Hampshire; the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation; the Cultural Council of Germany; and the Pollock-Krasner Foundation, among others. Goetz recently received a Design Award from the Public Design Commission for the City of New York. She holds degrees from the Art Academy in Kassel, Germany, and the University of Applied Sciences in Wurzburg, Germany. Goetz lives and works in Berlin and is represented by Schwarz Contemporary, Berlin.