Rosemarie Trockel

Early Works• During Trockel’s career, it was strongly

debated as to whether women should be able to create artwork or not.

• “It was pointed out that Rosemarie Trockel’s transposed women’s handicrafts, and the kitchen as the woman’s traditional place, into the realms of high art and that, in doing so, she enhanced the cultural and ideological value of these traditional activities and role distributions.”

• In the 1980s, Trockel exhibited at the Cologne gallery of Monika Sprüth, who at that time showed only women artists.

• The German art scene was dominated by men, such as Joseph Beuys, Sigmar Polke and Gerhard Richter.

• However her rebellious inclinations soon pegged her as an ‘enfant terrible’. In the art world, this implies a successful “genius”/someone who is striking.

Art Work• Trockel uses a diverse range of materials

and techniques, involving videos, sculptures, installations, drawings and photographs.

• Trockel explores a variety of themes, such as:

Our relationship with the human body, the role of women in society, our attitude towards the treatment of animals and the function of symbols and their meaning in relation to art.

Feminist Relics• Rosemarie Trockel’s work is formulated from a

precise and obvious female perspective. However, the artist also outsmarts feminist clichés and leads them to falsification. The “hot plate” works establish a bridge between the "feminine domain" of cooking and the "masculine domain" of industrial production.

• Rosemarie Trockel’s “female” perspective extends beyond feminism. Her works are expressions, which distance herself from systems that demand social and sexual identity and gender-related pressure.

• ‘Eloquent feminist politics is the singular achievement of Trockel’s art’ – Brigid Doherty.

‘Affirmation of Difference in the Art of Rosemarie Trockel’ by Sidra StitchAccording to Stitch, Trockel’s work:• ‘Challenges premises about consistency, authority,

bipolar opposition, the unified subject, fixed meaning and autonomy.’

• ‘Heightens an awareness of difference, especially in the representation of women.’

• ‘Shifts and transgresses boundaries, offering alternative possibilities, awakening consciousness about matters that have been omitted or taken for granted.’

• ‘Presents feminine perspective without asserting that feminine is superior or exclusive to masculine.’

Untitled, 1988

‘A Cosmos’ Exhibition‘A Cosmos’ highlights the rapid nature of Trockel’s mind. Trockel lurches from one discipline to the next, as well as merging different materials together. Perhaps this is why the work of others sits so comfortably shoulder-to-shoulder with her own: stylistic, conceptual and material jumps are integral to her practice.‘A Cosmos’ refers to all that exists, or once existed because many of the botanical and zoological artefacts mixed in with Trockel’s own work are dead.The exhibition is a world that Rosemarie Trockel has created with her own imagination. All of her views, beliefs and curiosities have been combined to create a journey through her mind.

Rosemarie Trockel – “Cosmos”“Plastic”

“My Dear Colleagues”, 1986, wool (red-white), plastics

• I am intrigued by her extensive and careful use of materials. Although Trockel works in a wide range of contrasting mediums and techniques, she appropriates the materials to the intent of the piece. Each piece is carefully thought out in order to convey an important message. For example, the use of wool as a typically women’s material, which she then mocks and discredits using logos such as the hammer and sickle motif of the Soviet Union and the Playboy bunny. Trockel is not a typical feminist because she does not discriminate against men, instead she supports women’s rights and emphasises the importance of equality.

• In my opinion Trockel’s use and arrangement of materials and objects in her work is what makes her art striking and successful as she is (on most occasions) using everyday objects to address an everyday concept. This brings to attention these objects, which we would usually over looked, and gives them an association with Trockel’s ideas so that the next time a viewer sees the object they are more likely to stop to consider the questions Trockel has now planted in their minds.