Past Event
Writer, critic and former opera singer Denise Wendel-Poray is in conversation with stage designer Philipp Fürhofer and former Whitechapel Gallery Director Iwona Blazwick to consider the intertwining of visual and musical arts examined in her book Painting The Stage: Artist’s as Stage Designers, reflecting on more than 200 years of artist’s designs for opera.
In association with Skira.
This event is part of the London Art Book Fair, for more information and to see rest of the events click here.
Denise Wendel-Porayis a Canadian writer, journalist and curator holding degrees from the Universities of Yale and McGill. She is the author of books and essays concerning the relationship between art, theatre and music. (Frauen-liebe und Leben, Hatje-Cantz, 2013; Painting the Stage, Skira, 2019).She has been guest curator Wilhelm Lehmbruck Museum in Duisburg Germany (2010-2012); at the Rupertinum Museum in Salzburg (William Kentridge 2017); Sammlung Friedrichshof Zurndorf, Austria (Wahlverwandtschaften 2018); RX Galerie Marais Paris (Hermann Nitsch Paintings Only2018); Galerie Éric Dupont Paris (Howard Hodgkin 2015, Sandro Kopp Take Time2016, Otto Muehl 2018). As a journalist she writes for Opera Canada Magazine, ArtPress, Quotidien de l’art, and the Wiener Kurier. She has given a seminar on stage design at the Kunstakademie in Dusseldorf. Her home is Paris.
Philipp Fürhofer’s multidisciplinary artistic practice combines paintings, sculptures, installations and set designs. His works are created with a singular language that combines modern materials, mixed with traditional and historical elements from operas, charged with associations that places the influence and heritage of 19th century German and Nordic Romantic painters in a contemporary context. His work has been presented in solo and group exhibitions in Paris, Milan, Sydney, Hong Kong, Hamburg, Cologne, Munich and Berlin. In 2018, Munich’s Kunsthalle invited him to create, based on his work, the concept and the scenography for the exhibition Du bist Faust that showcased more than one hundred artworks inspired by Goethe’s famous drama. In 2019 the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts commissioned him to design a gallery for the world touring retrospective of French Designer Thierry Mugler.
