Heinz Mack: The Sky over Nine Columns

After the notable and impressive presentations in Venice (2014), followed by Istanbul (2015/2016), the mo- numental installation 'The Sky Over Nine Columns' by Heinz Mack will be on view in Valencia at Ciudad de las Artes y las Ciencias (City of Arts and Sciences) from June until November 2016. The contrast between Santiago Calatrava's bright white and futuristic archticture and the lucid, golden steles by Heinz Mack is becoming the crucial point of the presentation at this new location.

The journey of this exceptional large-scale sculpture to unique places all over the world is a long-term art project, planned and realized by the Ralph Dommermuth Stiftung Kunst und Kultur in cooperation with Beck & Eggeling International Fine Art. St. Moritz, Athens, Tel Aviv, Chicago and Sydney are in discussion as further locations.

About the installation

'The Sky Over Nine Columns' consists of nine over seven meter high steles with a lightre ecting golden surface made up of 850.000 mosaic tiles with 24 ct. gold leaf. For the idea of an installation, Heinz Mack reverted to a design for the Peragmon Museum, which, however, was not realized up to date. A discourse as regards content with the Altntepe Temple in Anatolia, the Temples of Egypt as well as the six pillars of the Temple of the Queen of Sheba in Yemen is evident for Heinz Mack. The inter-cultural connection between Orient and Occident, which plays an important part in the oeuvre of the artist, is not only emphasized by the relation of the installation to historic temples, but also by the material of the mosaics used.

Heinz Mack has developed a genuine language of light and colour since the 1950s and is a leading exponent of kinetic art. The concept of ‘Light Stele’, to which 'The Sky Over Nine Columns' refers, was first formulated by Mack in the late 1950s in his Sahara Project. His works in public spaces – whether in urban settings or nature – are always conceived as objects for light: “Light is decisive for my art. As far as light is concerned, I want to go to the limits of the possible.” (Heinz Mack)

About the Artist

Born 1931 in Lollar (Germany), Mack studied at the Academy of Arts in Düsseldorf from 1950 to 1953. He also earned a de- gree in philosophy at the University of Cologne in 1956. Together with Otto Piene he founded the ZERO-group in 1958, which was joined by Günther Uecker in 1961. Receiving considerable attention with their exhibtion, activities and manifests, ZERO became an international movement. The artists developed a new language of form, using particularly light and movement in their works, in order to overcome the pessimism of post-war years and discover a new, open-minded world through art.
Heinz Mack participated at the documenta in Kassel in 1964 and 1977. In 1970, together with three other German artists, Mack represented Germany at the 35th Venice Biennale. The Museum of Contemporary Art in Teheran presented Heinz Mack as the rst „western“ artist after the Iranian Revolution with a comprehensive show in 2011. The same year, a large retrospective at the Kunst- und Ausstellungshalle der Bundesrepublik Deutschland in Bonn on the occasion of his 80th birthday, proceeded to raise the interest in the art of Heinz Mack. His work was represented with 23 exhibits in the much acclaimed ZERO-show at the Guggenheim Museum in New York in 2014. Recent major ZERO-exhibitions in Berlin, Amsterdam and Istanbul achieved international recognition. Mack‘s artworks are held in more than 130 public collections. His ouevre is documented in a wide range of publications as well as in two lms. Heinz Mack lives and works in Mönchengladbach and Ibiza.