Sarah Ortmeyer

Sarah Ortmeyer (born in Frankfurt, Germany) is a German artist.^[1][2] Her work spans across classic artistic disciplines such as sculpture, painting and publishing, recurring to non-traditional modes of display.^[3][4] Ortmeyer has exhibited internationally at venues including the Stedelijk Museum voor Actuele Kunst, Belvedere21,^[5] Palais de Tokyo, MAK Center, KW Institute for Contemporary Art,^[6] MoMA PS1, Performance Space New York, the Swiss Institute^[7] and has published several books,^[8][9] including a comprehensive volume on chess, politics, and aesthetics.^[10][11][12]

Sarah Ortmeyer attending Performance Space 2021 Gala, 2021

Early life and education

Ortmeyer was born in Frankfurt, Germany. She lived in Paris then moved to New York in 2008. She graduated from the University of Applied Arts in Vienna and from Städelschule, Academy of Fine Arts, Frankfurt am Main.^[13][14]

Work

Ortmeyer creates a wide range of works that oscillate in their dimensions between small-scale and large-scale and has collaborated with artists, poets, rappers, and musicians from various disciplines and generations, including Friederike Mayröcker, Yoko Ono, and Lafawndah.^{[15][16][17][18]}

For her stay at Hotel Marienbad in 2009, a previous exhibition entity of the KW Institute of Contemporary Art, the artist turned the rooms into a "hallucinatory version" of the Eiffel Tower.^[19][20][21] The artist is currently banned from the Eiffel Tower.^[22]

In 2010, Ortmeyer showed at Lodz Biennale in Poland,^[23] 303 Gallery in New York,^[24] MAK Center for Art and Architecture in Los Angeles, and at the Museum of Modern Art Warsaw.^{[12][failed verification]}

GRANDMASTERS WORLDCHAMPIONS is a 2012 artwork conceived specially at the Stedelijk Museum voor Actuele Kunst. A publication by the same title was made for the exhibition.^[25]

Ortmeyer showed at the Haus Wittgenstein in Vienna in 2013.^[26] That same year, the artist’s first solo exhibition in Italy, MACHO AMORE, was shown in Milan.^[3]

In 2014, Ortmeyer exhibited a sculpture series, titled SANKT PETERSBURG PARADOX, at the Swiss Institute in New York.^[27][28] Art critic Roberta Smith wrote for The New York Times that the artwork was, "a large, chaotic scatter piece involving numerous chessboards and several species of natural eggs, as if contrasting the elevated competition of board games with the dice toss of genetics."^[29]

Ortmeyer turned MoMA PS 1's Dome into a planetarium of egg-shaped stars within a grey-colored set for Valentine's Day in 2016.^[30] The third installment of her PALMA series was shown at the Belvedere 21 earlier that year.^[31]

In 2018, Ortmeyer was commissioned as an Associate Artist to develop a new visual identity and logo for Performance Space New York.^[32][33] During a studio visit with Milton Glaser, he "opened up her black heart painting with a scissor cut," birthing the iconic symbol.^[34] Later that year the silent movie FLYRT premiered at Kunstverein München, the result of Ortmeyer’s long lasting correspondence with a rising teen idol and rapper.^[35]

Themes

Since 2010, chess has become one of the central themes in Ortmeyer’s art, starting with the ongoing GRANDMASTER series.^[36][27] Additional themes explored in Ortmeyer's work include eggs from her MONSTER series,^[37] icons from her EMOJI SHADOW series, the devil from her DIABOLUS collection,^[38] palm trees from her PALMA collection,^[31] and the heart from her COR collection.

Ortmeyer works in the dialectical relationship between emotions and knowledge and between life and politics. She has created artworks on sports icons and the subject of collecting, on the mystery of female chess world champions, on nature-derived motifs or the fashion style of Immanuel Kant.^[39][40][41]

Public collections

• Stedelijk Museum voor Actuele Kunst^[42]
• Austrian National Library^[10]
• Nationalgalerie^[43]
• Hamburger Bahnhof, Berlin^[44]
• Museum der Moderne, Salzburg
• Fonds régional d'art contemporain Grand-Large-Hauts-de-France [fr] (formerly FRAC Nord-Pas de Calais)^[45]

See also

• List of German women artists

References

1. "Sarah Ortmeyer Biography – Sarah Ortmeyer on artnet". www.artnet.com. Retrieved 22 September 2021.
2. "An Index of Shadows: Sarah Ortmeyer — Mousse Magazine". www.moussemagazine.it. 26 February 2020. Retrieved 22 September 2021.
3. Salomonowitz, Yael (7 April 2014). "Sarah Ortmeyer". Frieze. No. 14. ISSN 0962-0672. Retrieved 24 September 2021.
4. Diehl, Travis (13 March 2017). "POTTS". www.artforum.com. Retrieved 22 September 2021.
5. "21er Raum: Sarah Ortmeyer | Belvedere Museum Vienna". www.belvedere.at. Retrieved 5 October 2021.
6. "In Berlin wird der Minimalismus politisch, und zwar 32 Mal hintereinander | Monopol". www.monopol-magazin.de (in German). Retrieved 5 October 2021.
7. Smith, Roberta (7 August 2014). "'The St. Petersburg Paradox' at the Swiss Institute". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 22 September 2021.
8. "Katalog der Deutschen Nationalbibliothek". portal.dnb.de. Retrieved 7 October 2021.
9. "Katalog der Deutschen Nationalbibliothek". portal.dnb.de (in German). Retrieved 7 October 2021.
10. "Schach, Ästhetik, Politik : zur Dialektik von politischen Umsprüngen und Schach". Austrian National Library (in German). 2014. from the original on 13 June 2023. Retrieved 13 June 2023.
11. Burke, Siobhan (13 February 2018). "When PS122 Became Performance Space New York". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 22 September 2021.
12. "Sarah Ortmeyer". Contemporary Art Library. Retrieved 24 September 2021.
13. "Sarah Ortmeyer by Stephanie Cristello - BOMB Magazine". bombmagazine.org. Retrieved 22 September 2021.
14. "TransArts: Sarah Ortmeyer". www.dieangewandte.at. Retrieved 22 September 2021.
15. "PORTRAIT: I HAVE ALWAYS WISHED FOR NOVEMBER". Spike Art Magazine. 25 September 2019. Retrieved 24 September 2021.
16. "Portrait Friederike Mayröcker". Spike Art Magazine. 4 June 2021. Retrieved 24 September 2021.
17. "km". www.kunstverein-muenchen.de. Retrieved 24 September 2021.
18. "SARAH ORTMEYER: INTERNATIONALIS". Retrieved 25 September 2021.
19. Williams, Gisela. "GLOBESPOTTERS; Berlin: Hotel Art". query.nytimes.com. Retrieved 24 September 2021.
20. "Ceal Floyer and Sarah Ortmeyer - Announcements - e-flux". www.e-flux.com. Retrieved 24 September 2021.
21. "Berlin hotel tells artists to pay for stay with artwork". Deccan Herald. 10 August 2009. Retrieved 24 September 2021.
22. Williams, Gisela (24 August 2009). "A Hotel Room With Only One Occupant: The Artist". In Transit Blog. Retrieved 24 September 2021.
23. "From the Liberty Square to Independence Square - Announcements - e-flux". www.e-flux.com. Retrieved 24 September 2021.
24. "One Leading Away from Another - - GALLERY EXHIBITIONS - 303 Gallery". www.303gallery.com. Retrieved 24 September 2021.
25. "NYAB Event - "One Leading Away From Another" Exhibition". www.nyartbeat.com. Retrieved 7 October 2021.
26. Perlson, Hili (25 January 2014). "Dvir Gallery". www.artforum.com. Retrieved 24 September 2021.
27. "The St. Petersburg Paradox | Swiss Institute". Retrieved 24 September 2021.
28. "The St Petersburg Paradox". The New Yorker. Retrieved 24 September 2021.
29. Smith, Roberta (7 August 2014). "'The St. Petersburg Paradox' at the Swiss Institute". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 24 September 2021.
30. "VALIUM VALENTINE : Andrew Wyatt and Sarah Ortmeyer | MoMA". The Museum of Modern Art. Retrieved 24 September 2021.
31. "21er Raum: Sarah Ortmeyer | Belvedere Museum Vienna". www.belvedere.at. Retrieved 24 September 2021.
32. Burke, Siobhan (13 February 2018). "When PS122 Became Performance Space New York". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 24 September 2021.
33. Battaglia, Andy (22 January 2020). "Performance Space New York Announces Radical Artist-Led Restructuring". ARTnews.com. Retrieved 7 October 2021.
34. "Kevin Space | PS NEW YORK". www.kevinspace.org (in German). Retrieved 24 September 2021.
35. "km". www.kunstverein-muenchen.de. Retrieved 25 September 2021.
36. "GRANDMASTER ZURICH NEW YORK by Sarah Ortmeyer | Swiss Re Art". www.swissre.com. Retrieved 24 September 2021.
37. "Sarah Ortmeyer | MONSTER VIII, 2016". Art Basel. Retrieved 24 September 2021.
38. "Riboca Digital". riboca.digital. Retrieved 24 September 2021.
39. "Katalog der Deutschen Nationalbibliothek". portal.dnb.de. Retrieved 24 September 2021.
40. "GRAND MASTERS, WORLD CHAMPIONS | SARAH ORTMEYER". S.M.A.K. (in Dutch). Retrieved 7 October 2021.
41. "Sarah Ortmeyer at SMAK Ghent - Artmap.com". artmap.com. Retrieved 7 October 2021.
42. "Faust". S.M.A.K. (in Dutch). Retrieved 5 October 2021.
43. "Die Alliierten (II), 2007 – Freunde der Nationalgalerie" (in German). Retrieved 5 October 2021.
44. ArtFacts. "Art after 1989 | Exhibition". ArtFacts. Retrieved 7 October 2021.
45. "VERNISSAGE AU FAMILISTÈRE DE GUISE AVEC NAVETTE GRATUITE AU DÉPART DE DUNKERQUE – Frac Grand Large". www.fracgrandlarge-hdf.fr. Retrieved 5 October 2021.