Gabriele Münter Prize 2007

The Gabriele Münter Prize for Fine Artists Over 40, the only prize in the world for female artists over the age of forty, was awarded this year for the fifth time. The jury selected Leni Hoffmann as the winner from among over 1,450 entrants, being particularly impressed by her extremely colourful works involving the use of plastic modelling material. Her hand-made, structured areas of colour change the surroundings of the respective work of art, turning walls or windows into pictures or sculptures.

Explaining its decision, the jury said: “While Leni Hoffmann’s works are based on colour, they are not paintings. She uses industrially produced materials, including plasticine, to work on large-scale architectural features. Her hand-made, highly structured areas of colour transform the immediate surroundings. Hence walls, windows and other surrounding elements assume the function of a picture.

In her large-scale projects the artist employs various media techniques to link the interior with the exterior and surface with space. The involvement of the public in the creative process extends the complexity of the works. The jury was convinced by the compelling nature, novelty and decisiveness of her artistic concept.”

Leni Hoffmann was born in Bad Pyrmont in 1962. She studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Nuremberg from 1982 to 1987 and was a master pupil under Professor Georg Karl Pfahler. Since 2002 she has been Professor of Free Painting at the Freiburg Section of the State Academy of Fine Arts in Karlsruhe. In 2003 she was a scholarship holder at the Villa Massimo in Rome. Leni Hoffmann lives and works in Düsseldorf.

The 40 artists whose works are on display at the exhibition are:
Uli Aigner, Munich; Kirstin Arndt, Ludwigsburg; Regine Bonke, Ratzeburg; Petra Böttcher, Efringen-Kirchen; Astrid Brandt, Wilhelmshaven; Katja Brinkmann, Berlin; Susanne Brügger, Essen; Danika Dakić, Düsseldorf; Ingeborg Dammann-Arndt, Sellstedt; Claudia Desgranges, Cologne; Ursula Döbereiner, Berlin; Dörte Eißfeldt, Neuenkirchen; Friederike Feldmann, Berlin; Hanna Frenzel, Berlin; Susann Gassen, Ockenheim; Jutta Geier, Berlin; Ute Heuer, Hanover; Christiane ten Hoevel, Berlin; Leni Hoffmann, Düsseldorf (prize winner); Nan Hoover, Berlin; Alexandra Hopf, Berlin; Dagmar Hugk, Cologne; Ulrike Kessl, Düsseldorf; Pascale Komarnicki, Berlin; Sigrid Kopfermann, Düsseldorf; Beate Passow, Munich; Chris Reinecke, Düsseldorf; Inken Reinert, Berlin; Nora Schattauer, Cologne; Ute Maria Schmid, Karlsruhe; Yukara Shimizu, Munich; Ulrike Siecaup, Cologne; Heidi Magdalene Sill, Berlin; Annegret Soltau, Darmstadt; Ilse Wegmann, Bad Honnef; Heide Weidele, Frankfurt am Main; Anna Werkmeister, Berlin; Jeong-Sook Yu, Düsseldorf; Uta Zaumseil, Triebes; Isabel Zuber, Freiburg.

The previous prize winners were
2004: Ulrike Rosenbach (video) and Cornelia Schleime (painting)
2000: Rune Mields (painting)
1997: VALIE EXPORT (multimedia)
1994: Thea Richter and Gudrun Wassermann (installation)

The prize is named after the German painter, Gabriele Münter (1877–1962), who became known through her membership of the Blauer Reiter (Blue Rider) community of artists and played a major role in the development of abstract painting. Together with Alexander Jawlensky, Marianne Werefkin, Wassily Kandinsky and others she founded the Neue Künstlervereinigung München (New Artists’ Association, Munich) in 1909 and the Blauer Reiter (Blue Rider) group with Kandinsky, Alfred Kubin and Franz Marc in 1911.