Isa Genzken: Rose II - New Museum

Good morning contemporary art lovers!
Each time I walk by the New Museum, seeing the twenty-eigth feet tall rose that is standing in front of the facade reminds the roses made by Will Ryman. For those who may don't remember Will's roses were blooming on Park Avenue for four-six months in the beginning of 2011. At this time all the New Yorkers were living in the Wonderland!

Isa Genzken is a German-born artist who was born in 1948. She lives and works in Berlin. She studied fine arts and art history in Hamburg and was the subject of a major retrospective in 2009 in Cologne and then in London. She used to be married to Gerhard Richter who was her teacher. She is best know for her sculpture Rose (1993). It is a single long-stemmed rose made from enamelled stainless steel that towers eight metres above Leipzig's museum district. A second version Rose II (2007) is standing in front of the facade of the New Museum. 

Genzken is one of the crucial figure of the Post-war contemporary art scene. Her works, sculpture essentially, are made of many different materials and media such as video, photography, film, works on paper and canvas, collages and books. The replica of the first sculpture Rose is her first public artwork in the United States. She's trying to explore through her work the way in which each one perceive objects, images, nature... She integrates the notions of architecture, nature of mass culture by creating unique works has the enormous scale.

Looking back on that experience, she has commented, “To me, New York had a direct link with sculpture… (It) is a city of incredible stability and solidity.” The installation of Rose II can be seen as a tribute to a place Genzken continues to love.