Wolfgang Mattheuer
Liegendes Liebespaar

Wolfgang Mattheuer’s Liegendes Liebespaar [Reclining Lovers] from 1970 has been on permanent display in the foyer of DAS MINSK KUNSTHAUS in Potsdam since March 2024. The bronze sculpture was previously part of the exhibition WERK STATT SAMMLUNG: Artworks from the Hasso Plattner Collection, Guest: Wilhelm Klotzek at DAS MINSK in Summer 2023.  

Two people are close together in what is both an intimate and stormy embrace. The woman’s braid blow backward, her right knee only gently touching the man’s left thigh. They don’t appear to really be reclining. Are they messing around? Falling? Or are they lifting off the ground?

Mattheuer’s sculptural work not only refers to a sculptural tradition, but is also closely linked to his painting and graphic art. In this work, he translates the recurring motif of the lovers from two-dimensionality into three-dimensional space. Two versions of a lithography entitled Liebespaar [Lovers] were created as early as 1964, in which an embracing pair fly over a crescent moon. A painting from 1972, Das vogtländische Liebespaar [Vogtland Lovers], on the other hand, shows a standing pair tightly embracing one another, and the painting Schwebendes Liebespaar [Floating Lovers] from 1970 also employs a variation on the motif of affectionate togetherness. The art historian and curator Dr. Heinz Schönemann emphasizes that the sculpture can be turned and rotated, it has “no top or bottom compared to the fixed floating state on the picture panel”[1]. This imbues the intimate moment in the sculpture Reclining Lovers with a particular expressiveness. Mattheuer captures the movement and thereby attempts to convey the carefree and secure feeling of connectedness.

Wolfgang Mattheuer, born 1927 in Reichenbach im Vogtland, died 2004 in Leipzig, was a painter, graphic artist, sculptor, and author. He described himself as an “image maker” and was one of the cofounders of the Leipzig School. His participation in Documenta VI (1977), extensive solo exhibitions, and acquisitions (including by the Hamburger Kunsthalle) made Mattheuer known to a broad public in the Federal Republic of Germany. As a critical observer of his time, his works bear witness to an ever-changing environment and society.

 

[1] Wolfgang Mattheuer: Gemälde, Zeichnungen, Druckgraphik, Plastik, exh. cat. Museum der bildenden Künste Leipzig (Leipzig, 1978), p. 40.