Nicole Wermers
Born 1971 Emsdetten, Germany – Lives in London
Sculpting minimalist forms without the visual language of autonomy or self-referentiality, Nicole Wermers grants her works a network and functional context. Shortly after completing her Masters in Fine Art at Central St. Martin’s College of Art and Design in London (1999), and before her London residencies at the Delfina Studio Trust (2004) and at the Camden Arts Centre (2005), Wermers began her best-known sculptural series French Junkies (2002). Tall, thin columns covered with decorative glass, plastic and wood, and topped by sandy ashtrays containing butted cigarettes imply use. In addition to her sculptures that communicate the desire for functionally designer lifestyles, Wermers produces Art History based collages and sculptures. Her series of works Abwasch Skulpturer (Dishwashing Sculptures, 2013), shown at Galleria S.A.L.E.S., Rome, uses Renaissance still life paintings as a point of reference. The paintings of prepared feasts are made three-dimensional. Piles of painted plates and cutlery allude to both a painted history and the history of the objects before their place on the tall plinth, just as her minimal sculptures suggest their potential use.
Wermers’ second exhibition at Herald Street Gallery, London, Infrastrukture (2015) won a nomination for the 2015 Turner Prize. Her first show at Herald Street titled A lifesize lifestyle… (2011) was a sculptural installation of couches, mascara wands and crushed cars chained together. In her first installation, chains solidified the network between the objects, made them literal. In Infrastruckture, the structures of social relations that bring the objects together are implied. Fur coats are permanently sewn to designer dinning chairs like cushions, left empty as if the elegant diner had left momentarily, leaving their coat to indicate ownership. Wermer also re-produced ‘tear off flyers’ in white clay. Non-functioning, the wall-hung clay works are fossils of an old networking device.
Born 1971 Emsdetten, Germany – Lives in London
Sculpting minimalist forms without the visual language of autonomy or self-referentiality, Nicole Wermers grants her works a network and functional context. Shortly after completing her Masters in Fine Art at Central St. Martin’s College of Art and Design in London (1999), and before her London residencies at the Delfina Studio Trust (2004) and at the Camden Arts Centre (2005), Wermers began her best-known sculptural series French Junkies (2002). Tall, thin columns covered with decorative glass, plastic and wood, and topped by sandy ashtrays containing butted cigarettes imply use. In addition to her sculptures that communicate the desire for functionally designer lifestyles, Wermers produces Art History based collages and sculptures. Her series of works Abwasch Skulpturer (Dishwashing Sculptures, 2013), shown at Galleria S.A.L.E.S., Rome, uses Renaissance still life paintings as a point of reference. The paintings of prepared feasts are made three-dimensional. Piles of painted plates and cutlery allude to both a painted history and the history of the objects before their place on the tall plinth, just as her minimal sculptures suggest their potential use.
Wermers’ second exhibition at Herald Street Gallery, London, Infrastrukture (2015) won a nomination for the 2015 Turner Prize. Her first show at Herald Street titled A lifesize lifestyle… (2011) was a sculptural installation of couches, mascara wands and crushed cars chained together. In her first installation, chains solidified the network between the objects, made them literal. In Infrastruckture, the structures of social relations that bring the objects together are implied. Fur coats are permanently sewn to designer dinning chairs like cushions, left empty as if the elegant diner had left momentarily, leaving their coat to indicate ownership. Wermer also re-produced ‘tear off flyers’ in white clay. Non-functioning, the wall-hung clay works are fossils of an old networking device.