Daniel Kuge's artistic works are speculations about how posterity might view our technological society and our legacies. How are anthropogenic traces, industrial artifacts, and the relationship between humans and their objects read and interpreted? How does mankind inscribe itself into the world with their objects and machines? Kuge simulates the perspective of a posterity. Unclear which time, unclear which knowledge, unclear whether humanoid. Decoding and interpretation of legacies for which the language, instructions and context have not survived.
Formations formed by angular bodies that keep their contexts, origins, relationships and meanings hidden behind sterile surfaces. Locating the reference points at a singular point in space and time becomes more difficult and leads to a simultaneity of past, present and future. They oscillate between a structual component and a cult object, between micro and macro, between monumentality and silence, between the material and the virtual.
The starting point for Daniel Kuge's art is his work on an image archive, which the artist has been working on for over 15 years and which includes around 20,000 photos, technical drawings, information graphics and other visualizations. His own photos are added to the structure, research on images, rearranged and then combined into a film, a painting or an object. The first impulse can come from an everyday object or a childhood memory. It can have something mysterious, grotesque, sublime or dreamlike or even tip into the uncanny. It can tell about human actions and refer to something cultic. It can tell of the past, but also contain something present or future. It can reveal a sadness and harshness. It can tell about perfection, but also about failure. It can have an elegance but also an ugliness. It can be part of the collective memory, but also part of its own world.
ABOUT THE ARTIST
Daniel Kuge graduated in visual communication from the FH Düsseldorf and in fine arts from the HBK Braunschweig. His professors and mentors were Michael Brynntrup, Frances Scholz, Hartmut Neumann, Kota Ezawa, Andreas Bee, Jan Verwoert, Gunnar Friel, Christian Jendreiko, Uwe J. Reinhardt and Gerhard Vormwald. Kuge has presented his work at film festivals and in international exhibition venues such as The Wrong Biennale, Kunsthalle Kohta Helsinki, Braunschweig International Film Festival, Kunsthalle Recklinghausen, Museum Kunstpalast Düsseldorf, Kunstverein Braunschweig, Temporary Gallery Cologne, Stuttgarter Filmwinter, Verein der Düsseldorfer Künstler, Galerie koal Berlin, Mönchehaus Museum Goslar and Shoot the Lobster New York City. Daniel Kuge has been awarded numerous grants, he is a NEUSTART KULTUR scholarship holder from the Stiftung Kunstfonds, was shortlisted for the Kunstpreis Junger Westen for sculpture in 2017 and is a award winner at the GROSSE Kunstausstellung NRW. In addition, Kuge's artistic work has been featured in several publications and articles.
AWARDS + GRANTS (selection)
2024 Project Funding / City of Braunschweig, DE.
2024 Studio Funding / City of Braunschweig, DE.
2022 Working Grant / NEUSTART KULTUR with Stiftung Kunstfonds / Bonn, DE.
2021 Project Funding / NEUSTART KULTUR - Modul D / Berlin, DE.
2020 Working Grant / Salzwedel-Stipendium /
Salzwedel, DE.
2019 Working Grant / Künstlerhaus Otte 1 / Eckernförde, DE.
2019 Working Grant / St. Moritz Art Academy / St. Moritz, CH.
2018 Artist in Residence / Mark Dion‘s Floodwater Residency / Gartow, DE.
2017 Shortlist / Kunstpreis Junger Westen / Recklinghausen, DE.
2017 Prize / DIE GROSSE Kunstausstellung NRW / Düsseldorf, DE.
SOLO SHOWS (selection)
2025 Malerkapelle, Königslutter / [with
Jan Neukirchen].
2024 BBK Braunschweig / E-MM-BS24.
2021 Johann-Friedrich Danneil Museum, Salzwedel / Stipendiatenart [with Alba Franzel]
2021 Schleswig-Holsteinisches Künstlerhaus Eckernförde / EA-MG-E21
2021 Kunstschaufenster - Hallenbad Wolfsburg / C4-WOB.
2020 Kuenstler und Stipendiatenhaus Salzwedel / Künstler-Café
2019 HBK Braunschweig / DK-2099.
2017 Verein der Düsseldorfer Künstler / Förderpreis DIE GROSSE 2017.
2016 Kunstraum 53, Hildesheim / EKR1-R1-H16.
SCREENINGS + FILMOGRAPHY (selection)
2024 Stuttgarter Filmwinter / VANO-G3MS1-23
2023 The Wrong Biennale Television / VANO-G3MS1-23
2023 Braunschweig International Film Festival / VANO-G3MS1-23
2023 Kunstverein Braunschweig / VANO-G3MS1-23
PUBLICATIONS (selection)
2022 Schrift, Bild, Handlung / by Dirk Westerkamp / Meiner Verlag, Hamburg.
2022 DIE GROSSE Kunstausstellung NRW, Düsseldorf.
2021 Zeitschrift für Ästhetik und allgemeine Kunstwissenschaft / Meiner Verlag, Hamburg.
2020 Summer Issue 18 / by ArtMaze Mag, London.
2018 Un/Certain Futures / transcript Verlag, Bielefeld.
2017 Kunstpreis Junger Westen / Kunsthalle Recklinghausen.
GROUP SHOWS (selection)
2024 Kunstraum Hombyo, Zell (Mosel) / Meet me in the Garden.
2023 Ehemaliger Karstadt am Gewandhaus, Braunschweig / In Neuem Gewand.
2023 Kunstverein Braunschweig / TENDER SEEDS IN FRAGILE SPACES.
2023 One Trick Pony, Braunschweig / Trick 2.
2022 NRW Forum, Düsseldorf / DIE GROSSE Kunstausstellung NRW. 2
2022 Hauptbahnhof Düsseldorf / Miniatur-Biennale, Düsseldorf.
2021 Kunsthalle Kohta, Helsinki / First International Festival of Manuports.
2019 Mönchehaus Museum Goslar / Losing Touch?.
2019 gr_und project space, Berlin / Limbo Jets.
2019 Herzog Anton Ullrich Museum, Braunschweig / Camouflage.
2018 Städtische Galerie Wolfsburg / Momuments for a patch of grass.
2018 Museum Kunstpalast, Düsseldorf / DIE GROSSE Kunstausstellung NRW.
2017 Kunsthalle Recklinghausen / Kunstpreis Junger Westen.
2017 Galerie koal, Berlin / Tell Them We Said No.
2017 Shoot the Lobster, New York City / Kennen Sie Turner?.
2016 Temporary Gallery, Köln / One Month: After the materialization of the art object. 2016 HBK Braunschweig / Open Studios.
2016 < FAR OFF - Cologne Fair for Contemporary Art, Köln / Jack in the Box.
EDUCATION
2023 One-year Meisterschüler-class with Michael Brynntrup / film art at the HBK Braunschweig. Finished with Meisterschüler Degree.
2019 Studies in Fine Arts at the HBK Braunschweig with Frances Scholz, Hartmut Neumann and Kota Ezawa. Finished with German Diplom Degree.
2013 Studies in Visual Communication at the Peter Behrens School of Arts Düsseldorf with Christian Jendreiko, Gunnar Friel and Gerhard Vormwald. Finished with German Diplom Degree.