Astrid Klein

Astrid Klein (born 1951) is a German artist. Klein works in a variety of mediums including painting, collage photography and installation.

Biography

Astrid Klein was born in Cologne in 1951 and trained at the Köln International School of Design from 1973 to 1977.^[1]

Klein became a Visiting Professor at the University of Fine Arts in Hamburg in 1986. In 1993 she became Professor at the Academy of Visual Arts in Leipzig where she continues to head the fine arts course.^[2]

The artist has received a variety of awards including the Käthe Kollwitz Prize in 1997 and the Cologne Fine Art Award in 2001. She gained further popularity as one of the initiators of the PechaKucha presentation style.

Art

Photography

Klein began working with photography in 1978. Her early works were based on themes of human tragedy and often combined texts with images.^[3]

Klein produces photographic images on a large scale to make what she refers to as ‘photoworks’, distinguishing them from straightforward photographs. Starting with images drawn from newspapers and magazines, Klein transforms them with a variety of processing and printing techniques in the darkroom, often verging on abstraction.^[4] The resulting works question assumptions about photography as an accurate documentary medium.^[5]

Her photography work is in the permanent collection of the Tate.^[6]

References

1. "Astrid Klein at Sprüth Magers". Contemporary Art Daily. 15 September 2010.
2. "Astrid Klein". Women Artists in the 20th and 21st Century. Köln: Taschen. 2001. p. 275. ISBN 9783822858547.
3. "Astrid Klein, 'Petrified Vision' 1985". Tate. Retrieved 2016-03-05.
4. "Texture and Photography | Tate". www.tate.org.uk. Retrieved 2016-03-05.
5. "Astrid Klein, 'Petrified Vision' 1985". Tate. Retrieved 2016-03-05.
6. Foster, Alicia (2004). Tate women artists. London: Tate. p. 258. ISBN 9781854373113.