Stefan Strumbel – Where the Forest Remembers (exhibition poster)
2025
silkscreen print (signed)
80 x 60 cm, 31½ × 23⅝ in.
open edition

Stefan Strumbel (b. 1979, Offenburg, DE) initiates a change in social values: traditional ideals, clichéd notions of home, and the reality of the individual are dissolved and transformed into an aesthetic that becomes an allegory of social status symbols. He exposes the mechanism of a society that in its desire for status and the pursuit of consumerism surrenders to the constant attraction of the media. With his transformed objects, Strumbel successfully creates an illusionary world, which reflects societies real maladies.

Aluminium objects and bronze sculptures mark a new direction in the creative process by Stefan Strumbel, developping his leitmotif towards a more universal language. By incorporating bronze and aluminium in his practice, he reduces the range of colors to monochrome compositions, that receive their colors from patinating the surfaces. The objects resemble packaged canvases and sculptures. The bubble wrap and tape cast in aluminium and bronze deny access to the expected content: In reference to Marcel Duchamp‘s concept of the Readymade, Strumbel turns simple packaging into a fetish object. As an objet trouvé from a gallery or museum’s day-to-day routine, these works can also be considered a critical reflection on today‘s art market.

Stefan Strumbel is a self-taught artist living and working in Offenburg. His works have been exhibited in numerous institutions, including Kunstverein Hamburg (2012), Städtische Galerie Offenburg (2015), Kunstverein Göppingen (2015), Circle Culture Gallery in Berlin (2014, 2010), NRW-Forum Düsseldorf (2022), and the Rehmann Museum in Laufenburg (2024). He has received grants from the Kunststiftung Hohenkarpfen and the Montana Stipendium (both 2007). In addition to his exhibition practice, Strumbel has realized public art projects such as permanent sculptures for the Staatsbrauerei Rothaus and Sparkasse Offenburg (2016–2017), and stage design for the Opera Stuttgart (2014).