As a painter, Bernhard Martin (*1966) is one of the contemporary artists who draw their motifs from the flood of the Internet, social media, and art history in order to transform them spectacularly. Since the 1990s, his work has dealt with a wide variety of aspects of the visual worlds of the media and advertising. Influencers, press conferences, fake news as well as the specific language of social media form the fundus for Martin's themes. Mixed with his own visions and socio-critical commentaries, he transforms the found material on canvas into images that defy all conventional rules. Everything is possible, everything is conceivable! Accordingly, nothing is excluded in a furious pictorial world that the artist finds between everyday curiosities, absurd scenes from nature and the animal world, as well as in episodes from the world of work.
Dirty Job - Proper Income is therefore also the title of the exhibition at FS.ART, showroom in Tettnang. Martin shows here works in which from the cook, to the hairdresser to the judge several occupational groups are represented and are staged in famously painting. The painterly solutions that the artist finds are unique and stand up to comparison with the great figures of art history.
Already during his studies in Kassel Bernhard Martin moved to Spain. He spent seven years in Barcelona. Later, a scholarship took him to Nice, and in the 2000s he moved from Berlin to London. Today he lives and works in Berlin again.
Bernhard Martin looks back on numerous institutional exhibitions in a national and international context. Of these, among others, the following selection from 2000:
2015 "Fred Thieler Prize 2015", Berlinische Galerie, Berlin (K).
2011 "Eissalon Bernhard Martin", Deutsche Bank art space, Salzburg
2009 "Theme missed", Kunsthalle Lingen, Lingen (K)
2008 "Theme missed", Municipal Gallery Wolfsburg, Wolfsburg (K)
2006 "Missed opportunities", Arario Museum, Seoul (K)
2006 "Villa Arson" with Larry Pittman, Nice (K)
2002 "I would like to show you my wet area" with Peter Saul and Martin Kippenberger, MAMCO Genève, Geneva
2001 "softcore", Mannheimer Kunstverein, Mannheim (K)
2001 PS.1, MoMA, New York
Works by Bernhard Martin are in the following public collections (selection), among others:
Museum of Modern Art New York, Mamco Geneva, Migros Museum Zurich, Rubell Family Collection Miami, Deutsche Bank Frankfurt, FRAC Bourgogne Dijon, FRAC Ile de France Paris, Sammlung Sander Berlin, Sammlung Schaufler Sindelfingen, TBA 21 Vienna, Museum der Moderne Salzburg, Arario Museum Seoul, JP Morgan Chase & Co Manhattan.
FS.ART - Bernhard Martin: Dirty Job - Proper Income
