In his work, the Stuttgart-based artist Laurenz Theinert strives to create a reduced visual language that develops without any recognisable reference to the objective world. He is not interested in depicting reality in his photographic work. His photographs do not document things; they are neither narrative nor do they represent anything. For Theinert, the visible world is merely a starting point that allows him to use the means of photography to investigate the medium itself, as well as processes in space and time, such as changes in perspective or changing colour effects. His research, which is more intuitive than planned, results in images of great creative lucidity.
With contributions by Marli Hoppe-Ritter, Julia Otto, Laurenz Theinert, and Barbara Willert
Published and edited: Museum Ritter/Dr. Barbara Willert, 2024
With a foreword by Marli Hoppe-Ritter and an essay by Andreas Bee
Published and edited: Museum Ritter/Dr. Barbara Willert, 2023
The sculptor Camill Leberer is a paradigm shifter whose work broadly recalls painting and yet, in its various casts, is always the result of reflections on the way light and space are perceived. Camill Leberer has for many years been represented by the Marli Hoppe-Ritter Collection, which includes a number of his works. The exhibition, which is the result of close collaboration with the artist, places special emphasis on works that underline the geometric, rational aspect of his practice. A cubic “housing” made of glass, the shape of the square in his metal pictures, and a serial presentation of coloured sheets of sandpaper are all examples of this. The exhibition is complemented by a selection of works that present Leberer as also a draughtsman, photographer and poet.
With a foreword by Marli Hoppe-Ritter and a text by Hsiaosung Kok as well as an interview with the artist by Barbara Willert
Published and edited: Museum Ritter/Dr. Barbara Willert, 2023
Şakir Gökçebağ has come up with a refreshingly original version of minimalism in his art. His works consist of simple items of everyday use – all mass produced and preferably from hardware centres, clothes shops or general household stores. Taking simple everyday objects like coat hangers, umbrellas, or toilet rolls, he arranges them in subtle compositions that operate at the interface of abstraction and figuration.
With contributions by Marli Hoppe-Ritter and Barbara Willert as well as an interview with the artist
Published and edited: Museum Ritter/Dr. Barbara Willert, 2022
Peter Weber is known for his complex foldings. After an initial phase as a constructive painter, during which he was also a lecturer and musician, folding has been his sole means of artistic expression and design for around thirty years. He has now created around 1800 geometric folded structures: at first using paper and canvas, then also in materials such as watercolour board, plastic and steel. But it is above all his foldings in felt, which he has been creating since 2001, that have become Peter Weber's trademark. With them he occupies a unique position in the concrete art scene and has made a name for himself well beyond it.
With contributions by Marli Hoppe-Ritter, Hsiaosung Kok, Peter Weber, and Barbara Willert
Published and edited: Museum Ritter/Dr. Barbara Willert, 2022
The ZERO co-founder, painter and sculptor Heinz Mack has developed a staggering body of work over some 70 years of creative production. His pioneer work in the fields of Light Art, which he advanced in a series of visionary projects, exerts an unbroken fascination on us to this very day. Scarcely an artist of our times can, moreover, match up to him in terms of productivity and the diversity of his oeuvre.
With texts by Stephan Geiger, Marli Hoppe-Ritter, Hsiaosung Kok, Bettina Pelz, Sophia Sotke, and Barbara Willert
Published and edited: Museum Ritter/Dr. Barbara Willert, 2021
Vera Molnar is regarded as one of the foremost female practitioners of constructive concrete art and is one of the first ever women artists to produce works with a computer. Right from the outset, a fascination for systematic experimentation has been central to the work of this Hungarian artist who has resided since 1947 in Paris. And over the decades she has remained faithful to her aesthetic direction as a painter and drawer, and to her fondness for geometric imagery. With her focus set firmly on elementary forms such as square, circle and line, she has developed a large number of series that invite the viewer to stroll through her visual worlds, that bear the impress of variation, transformation and dis-order.
Published and edited: Museum Ritter/Dr. Barbara Willert, 2020
With the exhibition Szene Ungarn, Museum Ritter turns the spotlight onto current geometrical developments in Hungary. It gives a glimpse of the intriguing facets of abstract art that have been produced there over the last twenty years, and testifies to the enduring relevance of this visual grammar to both the older and younger generations of artists. For this show a total of fourteen established and more recent approaches have been selected, all by artists whose lives are based in or around Budapest. Looking back to the 1920s, it was also notably the Hungarian avant-gardists, such as Bauhaus teacher László Moholy-Nagy and the painter-publisher Lajos Kassák, who with their wide-ranging creations and theoretical discourses proved a major force in shaping the beginnings of Constructive Art. A further turning point came during the period of political liberalisation in Hungary during the 1960s, when a young, progressive generation injected new life into the art scene by employing the principles of Colour Field Painting, conceptual strategies, and new media.
With contributions by Marli Hoppe-Ritter, Dávid Fehér, Hsiaosung Kok, and Barbara Willert
Published and edited: Museum Ritter/Dr. Barbara Willert, 2019
This exhibition features recent works by Daniel Hausig, who is a both important and innovative representative of contemporary Light Art. Ever since his student days in Hamburg he has devoted himself to light as a (painting) material and artistic medium. His minimalist coloured light objects always feature state of the art technology, such as self-made electroluminescent silkscreen prints and digital LEDs with time-based management systems. Moreover, the light in his objects and sculptures is highly dynamic, varying constantly according to the artist’s directions, which regulate the colour progressions by means of programmed loops.
With texts by Julia Otto, Michael Schwarz, and Barbara Willert
Published and edited: Kunstmuseum Celle (Julia Otto)/Museum Ritter (Barbara Willert), 2019
Hans Jörg Glattfelder
From the Particular to the General
German-English exhibition catalogue, 56 pages
Price: € 16,80
Hans Jörg Glattfelder is one of the foremost exponents of Concrete Art and has been a decisive force in its continued development. Museum Ritter has taken his 80th birthday as the occasion to present a selection of choice works that highlight his oeuvre from the1960s to this day. Almost 30 paintings and reliefs from over five decades, together with around 50 collages and drawings grant deep insights into the various phases of his work. A particular delight for the viewer’s eyes is in addition a kinetic wall installation consisting of drip-shaped elements that constantly produce new impressions.
Wit texts by Stephan Geiger, Hans Jörg Glattfelder, Marli Hoppe-Ritter,
Serge Lemoine. and Barbara Willert
Published and edited: Museum Ritter/Dr. Barbara Willert, 2019
The catalogue provides a fascinating insight into the work of Ulrich Wagner. Geometrical shapes and graphic elements, serial clusters and rhythmically arranged configurations are the distinguishing features of his art. His pictures, wall objects and rooms, whose complex weave looks as though it has been spun from the autonomous forms that make up the constructivist vocabulary, are in fact based on structures from the visible world of buildings: as point of departure for his works the artist takes the layouts of plan cities such as Mannheim, New York and Mexico City, as well as maps of sites from the Nazi past. Wagner abstracts these original sources and fragments them into amenable pieces that can be combined and layered and ultimately embedded in an aesthetic system.
With a text by Gabriele Uelsberg and an interview with Ulrich Wagner
Published and edited: Museum Ritter/Dr. Barbara Willert, 2018
Jacob Dahlgren. Quality Through Quantity
German-English exhibition catalogue, 39 pages
Price: € 14,80
The catalogue to the exhibition gives a fascinating glimpse into the extraordinary work of the Swedish artist Jacob Dahlgren (born 1970). His art is created chiefly from everyday mass produced articles – plastic coat hangers, pencils, folding rulers or handsaws, which he employs in large numbers to produce pieces in which the principle of multiple repetition has a transformational effect and results in something new. In these works, Dahlgren takes the apparent seal of approval in the legend “Quality instead of Quantity” to the point of absurdity. He proves that quantity and quality are not mutually exclusive, because quality can also come about through quantity.
With texts by Marli Hoppe-Ritter, Jens Asthoff and Barbara Willert
Published and edited: Museum Ritter/Dr. Barbara Willert, 2017
Spatial Miracles
Installations, Spatial Constructions, Light Sculptures
German-English exhibition catalogue, 88 pages
Price: € 21,80
The catalogue presents seven approaches currently employed by artists to capture, shape and expand space in subtle and complex ways. The concept of space entails not only figural and constructive aspects, but above all social, interactive and virtual components. While Annett Zinsmeister has created a spatial installation that allows the construction of the Museum to be experienced in a new way, Jacob Dahlgren has filled his gallery space with a walk-in cube made of coloured ribbons. Annette Sauermann’s sculptures done in concrete and coloured acrylic glass sensitise to the subtle manifestations of light in space. Hans Kotter for his part creates illusionistic light objects to explore the spatial effect of light in combination with mirrors. Similarly Manuel Knapp’s large, symmetrical constructions done in yarn are revolve round playing with our perceptions: his work opens up a whole range of vibrating colour spaces. Finally, two artists in the exhibition inquire into space as the place in which one lives: Beat Zoderer’s Plattenbau is an ironic comment on mass housing developments, which are generally taken to task for their monotony. By contrast, the model-like houses and dwellings devised by Tamás Kaszás present various possibilities for an autonomous life-style that is easy on our physical resources.
With texts by Marli Hoppe-Ritter, Hsiaosung Kok and Barbara Willert
Published and edited: Museum Ritter/Dr. Barbara Willert, 2016
Christian Megert. Without beginning or end
German-English exhibition catalogue, 64 pages
Price: 19,80 €
Christian Megert was one of the very first artists to use mirrors and make them the subject of his art. In the 1960s he was a member and promoter of the European ZERO movement. Over the decades he has created a rich body of works from mirrors and reflecting materials. It includes collages, objects and luminokinetic works, as well as room installations and outdoor sculptures.
The catalogue gives an insight into Christian Megert’s artistic production from the 1950s to the present.
With texts by Marli Hoppe-Ritter, Peter Iden, Hsiaosung Kok and Barbara Willert
Published and edited: Museum Ritter/Dr. Barbara Willert, 2015
Dóra Maurer is one of the most important exponents in contemporary Hungarian art and internationally one of the leading names in current concrete art. So it comes as little surprise that she has been represented for some years now by two exceptional geometrical paintings in the Marli Hoppe-Ritter Collection, which concentrates on works from the geometric-abstract tradition.Looking back at the artist’s 50 year career, it is also immediately evident that her output has not been restricted solely to constructive, concrete art. Dóra Maurer’s œuvre distinguishes itself rather by its astonishing wealth of different facets. Over the decades she has created a constantly developing body of work that combines conceptual tendencies with a geometrical grammar of forms that not only has political connotations, but also involves systematic analyses and mathematical methodologies. Similarly impressive is the range of media she uses: throughout her lengthy career, Maurer has employed a great variety of genres including prints, collage, photography, film and painting. The catalogue to the exhibition Dóra Maurer. Snapshots with its rich selection of illustrations provides a fascinating insight into the work of the Hungarian artist.
With texts by Marli Hoppe-Ritter, Dieter Bogner, József Mélyi and Barbara Willert
Published and edited: Museum Ritter/Dr. Barbara Willert, 2014
Seven
Current Approaches in the
Marli Hoppe-Ritter Collection
German-English exhibition catalogue, 86 pages
Price: € 21,80
For many artists working today, the geometrical grammar of forms is and remains an inexhaustible resource for pursuing aesthetic concepts and rendering them along their own personal lines. The aim of the exhibition SEVEN and the accompanying publication is thus to present current approaches in concrete art on the basis of works in the Marli Hoppe-Ritter Collection. The choice fell on seven young artists whose output constitutes a fascinating diversity of ideas, media and genres: Enrico Bach, Sebastian Hempel, Katharina Hinsberg, Karsten Konrad, Miriam Prantl, Haleh Redjaian and Martina Schumacher. Featured here are painting, drawing, kinetic art, art objects and light art, as well as two video pieces. The publication gives not only a clear insight into the various approaches in the field of geometrical abstraction, but also grants a lucid overview of the seven artists’ current production.
With texts by Marli Hoppe-Ritter, Hsiaosung Kok and Barbara Willert
Published and edited: Museum Ritter/Dr. Barbara Willert, 2014
Grazia Varisco is one of the foremost representatives of Italy’s Arte Programmata, an avant-garde movement of the 1960s that openly welcomed scientific progress and the dynamism of modern industrial society, and that proclaimed a new aesthetic based on technological culture. As such she was part of a movement that spread right across Europe and set out to fundamentally rethink art.
The objects and kinetic works that Grazia Varisco has created throughout a period of over five decades testify not only to a great love of experimentation, but also to an unflagging ingenuity in the way she approaches a great diversity of materials. Using superimposition, grid interference patterns and the carefully considered interplay of light, shadow and movement, she suspends our conventional patterns of perception and presents a wealth of visual possibilities that enable us to experience flowing and developing structures, the genesis of virtual forms, and the variability of the image.
With contributions by Marli Hoppe-Ritter, Hsiaosung Kok, Francesco Tedeschi
Published and edited: Museum Ritter/Dr. Barbara Willert, 2013
The catalogue to the exhibition “Daniel Buren. Broken Squares” with its rich selection of full-page illustrations provides a fascinating insight into the work of the celebrated French artist Daniel Buren. Artistic interventions in existing structures – whether buildings, plazas or streets – are Daniel Buren’s speciality. Over the decades he has travelled the world in order to open up new possibilities for our ways of seeing, using often simple but always carefully thought-out and compelling means. For the Museum passage, the conceptual artist has devised a
Bright and cheery light installation and a sophisticated striped square. The exhibition and the catalogue are rounded off by a walk-in installation in the exhibition gallery and a selection of individual works.
With contributions by Marli Hoppe-Ritter, Dorothea van der Koelen, and Barbara Willert
Published and edited by Museum Ritter/Dr Barbara Willert, 2013
The catalogue “Portrait of Disorder. Esther Stocker” which accompanies the exhibition of the same name presents the latest work by south Tyrolean artist Esther Stocker, one of the most thrilling and original young women artists working in the contemporary field of geometrical art. The exhibition and catalogue show newly-created photographic works and several large-size paintings that were done specially for the show. In these paintings the grid structures that have been so characteristic of Esther Stocker’s oeuvre have now been fully resolved into slivers of geometrical forms. Disorder has gained the upper hand here over order, so that the impression of a pulsating image arises in the beholder’s eye. A particular highlight at the exhibition is an installation consisting of black geometrical elements that Esther Stocker has set up in the Museum staircase. For this the artist has extended the principles behind her painting into the third dimension. The catalogue contains numerous illustrations of the installation.
With contributions by Marli Hoppe-Ritter, Johan Holten, Barbara Willert
Publisher: Museum Ritter/Dr. Barbara Willert, 2012
The centenary of the Alfred Ritter chocolate factory provided a welcome opportunity for Museum Ritter to take a look at artists from the last 100 years who have either taken chocolate as their material, or who have in other ways made it the subject of their work. Along with texts on the history and development of chocolate as an art material, the catalogue presents in a variety of texts and images around 60 objects, paintings, prints, installations, photographs and videos made of and about the motif of chocolate by almost 40 artists through. As such, the publication gives a broad insight into the different ways artists have explored chocolate – from historical approaches to contemporary works.
With contributions by Marli Hoppe-Ritter, Nike Bätzner, Dirk Dobke, Jörg Meißner and Barbara Willert.
Publisher: Museum Ritter/Dr. Barbara Willert, 2012
Brigitte Kowanz is one of the most important light artists in the world today. For many years now she has traced out the immaterial manifestations of light and its qualities in space and time, and lent them artistic form. Through a combination of media - light, mirrors and language - her works create special perceptual experiences that open up new avenues of understanding and visualise them with great vividness. Both the exhibition and the catalogue show not only her large light works with mirrors, but also a number of wall-pieces from the artist’s very latest set of works, in which light, Morse code and stainless steel plates are all combined.
With contributions by: Marli Hoppe-Ritter, Michael Schwarz and Barbara Willert.
Publisher: Museum Ritter/Dr. Barbara Willert, 2011
Rita Ernst has constantly experimented with new forms of geometrical-constructive painting for around 30 years. The delight she takes in looking enables her to fathom the patterns and structures in her everyday world and analyse predefined elements, architectural ground plans and oriental ornamentation. At the same time she combines system-based transformational processes based on addition, superimposition and accentuation with an atmospheric sense of colour. This rich cosmos of forms and colours is captured by the catalogue to her exhibition.
With contributions by Marli Hoppe-Ritter, Hsiaosung Kok, Rita Noack and Barbara Willert.
Publisher: Museum Ritter/Dr. Barbara Willert, 2011
The 160-page strong catalogue with its superb cloth binding presents Calderara’s artistic production with a wealth of colour reproductions. Calderara is highly regarded and much admired both by many connoisseurs of concrete art, as well as by numerous artists in the tradition – despite (or precisely because of) the fact that his paintings are different from much that is to be seen in the field of constructivist-geometrical art. During his never-ending appraisal of the landscape in upper Italy around Lake Orta, Calderera developed his personal artistic language which assumes a unique place in the geometrical tradition. His works point beyond mere rational thought to an emotional or spiritual level.
With contributions by: Marli Hoppe-Ritter, Andreas Bee, Raimer Jochims, Rupert Walser and
Barbara Willert.
Publisher: Museum Ritter/Dr. Barbara Willert, 2011
The exhibition and the richly illustrated catalogue "black box" focus on the current work of Regine Schumann and show a representative selection of her wall and floor pieces. Included are not only objects that are in the tradition of constructive-concrete art, which compel by their clear formal language, but also organically-shaped crochet objects made of fluorescent plastic cords, which the artist makes herself in a time- and energy-consuming process. The catalogue invites us to plunge into Regine Schumann’s magic world of glowing colours. The illustrations in the catalogue have been printed with a special technique, and fascinate with their highly intensive colours.
With contributions by: Marli Hoppe-Ritter, Michael Schwarz and Barbara Willert
Publisher: Museum Ritter/Dr. Barbara Willert, 2010
Timm Ulrichs. Looking Back to the Future
German-English exhibition catalogue, 136 pages
Price: € 24,80
Museum Ritter has honoured Timm Ulrichs on his 70th birthday with a large solo show featuring around 80 works spanning five decades, a film portrait, and outdoor works, which together give a vivid picture of this exceptional artist’s creative output. The catalogue contains a CD audio guide to accompanying visitors round the exhibition, complete with the artist’s typically wry and witty comments on the art system and scene.
With contributions by: Andreas Bee, Thomas Deecke, Marli Hoppe-Ritter, Thomas Knubben, Astrid Mayerle, Gerda Ridler, Timm Ulrichs, Lambert Wiesing
Publisher: Museum Ritter/Gerda Ridler, 2010
François Morellet. Squaring the Square
German-English exhibition catalogue, 96 pages
out of stock
Price: € 21,80
François Morellet is one of the foremost representatives of Geometrical Abstraction and is regarded as one of the co-founders of Concrete Art. For over half a century he has created abstract compositions in which he brings together a rational, systematic approach with playful levity and cryptic irony. Museum Ritter paid tribute to his outstanding artistic approach by means of a solo show. With around 50 works, the exhibition and the catalogue both give a representative cross-section of his work.
With contributions by François Morellet, Marli Hoppe-Ritter, Gerda Ridler, and Barbara Willert
Publisher: Museum Ritter/Gerda Ridler, 2009
Order and disorder, system and chaos - Alighiero Boetti thought in these categories, and his art circled around these two poles. In over three decades he gave ever-new expression to his dualistic world view and created a whole cosmos in which opposites interact effortlessly with one another. At the same time the sheer range of this autodidact’s output was enormous. The catalogue gives a clear insight into Alighiero Boetti’s highly diverse work.
With contributions by Barbara Willert and Andreas Bee
Publisher: Museum Ritter/Gerda Ridler, Verlag Das Wunderhorn, 2008
Guest Show. The Marli Hoppe-Ritter Collection
as Seen by Artists
German-English exhibition catalogue, 72 pages
Price: € 19,80
With contributions by Marli Hoppe-Ritter, Claudia Emmert, Heinz Gappmayr, Thomas Knubben, Petra von Olschowski, Gerda Rilder and Andreas Pinczewski
Publisher: Museum Ritter/Gerda Ridler, Verlag Das Wunderhorn 2008
Werner Bauer Lux Lucis …Declensions of Light
German-English exhibition catalogue,
An original OLF object has been integrated into the book wraps, 72 pages
Price: € 24,80
Werner Bauer has dedicated his entire artistic output to declining light and enriching the discipline of Concrete Art by new visual and material dimensions. Light – both natural and artificial – is centre of focus in Werner Bauer’s artistic explorations. With the highest of aesthetic standards he exemplifies phenomena from the realms of physics and using innovative technical materials finds constantly new declensions of light.
The catalogue gives a representative cross-section of the œuvre of this celebrated light artist. With contributions by Marli Hoppe-Ritter, Eugen Gomringer, Isolde Köhler-Schommer, and Gerda Ridler
Publisher: Museum Ritter/Gerda Ridler, Verlag Das Wunderhorn, 2008
“Bildertausch 3” – the third new presentation of the Marli Hoppe-Ritter Collection shows outstanding works that in a number of cases had languished in the depots and never previously been exhibited. Around 60 exhibits from the 1950s to the present direct the visitor’s gaze to a variety of current approaches in Abstract Geometric art. This folder contains ten high quality prints reproducing artworks from the collection. Texts and biographical data on the most important artists in the exhibition round off the folder. With contributions by Jutta Fischer and Barbara Willert.
Publisher: Museum Ritter/Gerda Ridler
Geneviève Claisse. Beyond the White Square
German-English exhibition catalogue, 72 pages
Price: € 21,80
Geneviève Claisse is one of the foremost practitioners of Abstract Geometric art in France today. A larger selection of her work was presented for the first time in Germany at her exhibition in Museum Ritter. Over the past 50 years Geneviève Claisse has created an extensive body of work that captivates above all by its subtly balanced colours and forms. Inspired by the early geometrical Constructivist movement around Kasimir Malevich and Auguste Herbin, she has developed her own inimical style.
With contributions by Marli Hoppe-Ritter, Geneviève Claisse, Denise René, Dominique Szymusiak, and Barbara Willert.
Publisher: Museum Ritter/Gerda Ridler, Verlag Das Wunderhorn, 2007
Movement in a Square. The Square in Painting, Kinetic Art and Animation
German-English exhibition catalogue with Audio-CD, 172 pages
Price: € 24,80
The catalogue shows around 70 select works from the broad and heterogeneous field of "art in motion". For this the term “motion” is broadly defined and embraces the general depiction of motion, the presentation of illusion of motion, which may be elicited by quite different optical phenomena such as light and shade, the movement of the viewer or his eyes, and also the actual motion of the work by means of its own motor or external propulsion. The majority of the presented works come from the Marli Hoppe-Ritter collection, augmented by important loans.
With contributions by Marli Hoppe-Ritter, Andreas Pinczewski, Frank Popper, Gerda Ridler, Susann Scholl, and Barbara Willert.
Publisher: Museum Ritter/Gerda Ridler, Verlag Das Wunderhorn, 2006
Marcello Morandini. Bianco e nero
German-English exhibition catalogue, 72 pages
out of stock
Price: € 21,80
Bianco e nero – black and white: this strident contrast is the basis of Marcello Morandini’s creative output. The Italian artist and designer is one of the foremost contemporary representatives of geometrical constructive art in Europe. Already at the outset of his artistic career in the early 1960s he arrived at the main parameters for his designs. The sole use of simple geometrical forms and the transformation of a basic element by means of mathematical rules are no less a part of his means than his deliberate restriction to the non-colours black and white.
With contributions by Marli Hoppe-Ritter, Ralf Christofori, Gerda Ridler, and Barbara Willert.
Publisher: Museum Ritter/Gerda Ridler, 2006