Gregor Russ admits it when he said that his professional dilletante constantly opens up a new artistic freedom for him. The artist based in Düsseldorf understands how to break apart the border between „non-art“ & art with his unconventional pieces – exciting, full of contrasts and always with mischievous wink. Almost 30 of his specially curated Artworks are now on display in the rooms of the PR Agency textschwester and its 400 square meter area.
In his latest exhibition „Ende der Präsenzkultur“ (ending the culture of presence), expressive colourfulness encounters the surreal insanity and charm of the old times in a modern ambience. In an open, contemporary atmosphere, Russ is presenting in 2021 a variety of his diverse art. His pieces embody a sensual and conceptual collages, with surreal creations and projection areas for geometric shapes, contours rich in contrast and ludicrous materials such as glass-eyes, fabric leftovers and artificial eyelashes. Russ is combining seemingly incompatible aspects into a new area of mind & visuals while creating a relation between the past and the present. He adds that he understands his work as a collage – in which, due to deconstruction and re-assembling, new structures and abstractions are created for various additional interpretations. Its crucial for him to surprise himself with his art and live through the moment of amazement. His creative approach is based on geometric grids, either on paper, canvas or three dimensionally painted and afterwards printed on wood. Visuals and text fragments out of literature and art play a major role in Russ‘ pieces while the ultimate idea behind his work remains the reutilisation of cultural history. Russ explains that he utilizes things, that have a certain connotation to them, extracts them out of their template and introduces them to the foreign terrain so they start a new live.
About the artist:
After his education to become a Carpenter, Russ moved, from Karlsruhe where was born, to Düsseldorf to study interior design from 1992 until 1997. Since 1999 Gregor Russ holds regularly Exhibition nationwide. Next to his artistic work he is also active as a curator, providing support for expositions projects and realizing these into the architectural formats. The independent exhibition room Parkhaus (carpark) in Düsseldorf was found in 1997 by him in collaboration with two artist friends. Initially planned as a true exhibition space the Parkhaus developed itself interdisciplinary room theme base fil events and panel discussion. Meanwhile it became one of the famous places in this kind across Germany.