‘Body language’ is the keyword in the art of Anne Imhof. Body language, speaking with the body, corporeal speaking – all these linguistic phrasings combine expression and form, attitude and movement. Imhof always involves the body in her work. In spite of this, she wouldn’t call her pieces performance art, but rather painting. Painting and drawing are for her the starting point of her works and the crucial medium of her art. This is how the drawings that were created as “scratches” on an extremely shiny black surface can be viewed. These highly aesthetic works are comparable to abstract drawings, where fine silvery lines permeate a black background. At the same time these lines are also clearly injuries to the highly glossy area. The lines destroy and are yet fragile, while in the remaining area of the work the viewer’s image is reflected as in a mirror. One is forced to move in order to see the work without one’s own reflection. The viewer has to perform, react and finally interact with the image, as does the audience in Imhof’s multi-hour performances entering into an interactive process in the most diverse ways.

Anne Imhof was born in Gießen in 1978. She lives and works in Frankfurt.