Mishmash (Masha Sumina and Misah Leykin) is an artist duo from Moscow who work internationally and who have repeatedly moved their place of residence and work between Russia, the USA and Europe. They currently live and work in Berlin. According to their changing places of residence, the theme of their new work is also changing places, borders and geographies. The geography of our lives has inevitably changed. Now we live in one place, love another, work in a third. The only reliable place so far is the virtuality, the network.
Christian Henkel sees himself as a sculptor who builds architectures for his pictorial ideas, whereby his sculptures serve as image carriers for his paintings. His spatial installations of constructed and deconstructed objects are indications of architectural processes influenced by constructivism, modernism and abstract ‚color field painting‘.
A strong focus lies in the use of color; while the forms of the sculptures are of simple recognizable originality, the specific use of color aims at the individuality of each work. It is a processual development from painting to sculpture into a three-dimensional vital painting installation – a space as image.
‚And so I mix, if you like, the aesthetics of favela and brutalism, of Schlager and bossa nova, allotment garden meets Bauhaus and tradition and modernity…‘
The installation „Heart shaped box“ is one of the first in Christian Henkel’s new series of sculptures in combination with wall paintings. The associative title is based on one of Henkel’s favorite Nirvana songs; almost exactly 30 years old and thus an homage to this band.
