Anne Imhof
Room IV

Artist
Anne Imhof

Title
Room IV

Year of creation
2021

Technology and dimensions
steel, glass, mattress made of foam and leather, speakers, electric guitar, 242 x 370 x 220 cm | 95 1/4 x 145 3/4 x 86 5/8 inches

Year of acquisition
2024

Acquisition
donated by FRIENDS of the Nationalgalerie, with the support of Marc Müller and Sprüth Magers.

Anne Imhof has emerged with long -lasting performances since the 2010s, including 2016 the performance of Fear II in the historic hall of the Hamburg train station. The Room IV plant comes from an exhibition shown in Paris in 2021 entitled Nature Mortes, in which visitors were led by corridors and rooms made of glass panes and metal plates. These sculptural architectures formed the stage for performances that the artist developed together with her participants. The title Nature Mortes literally means "dead natures", as a technical term it serves in art history as a name for the genre of "still life". The sculpture Room IV, which is assembled from elements of the Paris exhibition and still has traces of the performances at that time, can also be considered "still lifes", as a staging of lifeless objects. It exists as a silent sculpture in the present and refers to an event in the past. This work thus challenges the museum to convey both the context of origin and the independent sculpture.

Gabriele Knapstein

Anne Imhof, Room IV, 2021 / steel, glass, foam and leather mattress, loudspeaker, electric guitar / Berlin State Museums, Nationalgalerie / acquired in 2024 by the FRIENDS of the Nationalgalerie with the support of Marc Müller and Sprüth Magers © Anne Imhof Courtesy Kunstmuseum Winterthur / Gunnar Meier

Image sources

  • W-imhofInstall-SMBHomepage_ao: Anne Imhof, Room IV, 2021 / steel, glass, foam and leather mattress, speakers, electric guitar / Berlin State Museums, Nationalgalerie / acquired in 2024 by the FRIENDS of the Nationalgalerie with the support of Marc Müller and Sprüth Magers © Anne Imhof Courtesy Kunstmuseum Winterthur / Gunnar Meier