Bucerius Kunstforum Hamburg | DE
13.06.2015 – 20.09.2015
Water is necessary to all forms of life on earth. Every culture has a wealth of myths and religious rites related to water. Water continues to be a relevant issue today due to the threat of water shortages, environmental pollution and climate change. The exhibition The Day Will Come When Water Matters brings together paintings and photographs from 1800 to today. It traces water’s power to inspire artists across a period of more than two centuries to the present day. In the nineteenth century, natural science demystified the natural world. J.M.W. Turner led modern artists who dedicated themselves to the aesthetics of water beyond its role in mythology by making water itself a motif. A short time later photography became a new medium that allowed innovative opportunities to capture an image of this constantly moving natural element. Painters and photographers freed the water from the constraints of landscape painting and focused on the various forms of its changing appearance – from water drops, snowflakes and sheets of ice, to falling, raging and flowing water, to the reflective and moving surfaces of water whose mightiest manifestation is found in surging waves. Water in its many different forms continues to inspire artists today. Its aesthetic allure and existential importance affects everyone. This exhibition demonstrates how artistic and social issues dealing with water have become increasingly volatile since 1800.
Auguste Renoir (1841-1919): Meeresbild, Guernesey, um 1883, Musée d’Orsay, Paris
Link to the exhibition: When Water Matters. Painting and Photography from J.M.W. Turner to Olafur Eliasson.
