COLOGNE.- Art Cologne (19 - 22 April) offers the utmost quality at all levels, from modern through postwar to contemporary art, while the “NEUMARKT” section and “COLLABORATIONS”, which shows 22 selected and curated projects presented by 36 galleries, offer insights into current art production.

Around 210 internationally renowned galleries from 33 countries will participate in Art Cologne 2018. These include high quality presentations from top international galleries such as Hauser & Wirth, Thaddeus Ropac and David Zwirner, where one can see important works of contemporary art. Larry Gagosian, considered a heavyweight in the industry, is coming to Cologne for the second time. For its 52nd edition, the art fair also features a number of important returnees and first time exhibitors, including the London-based Lisson Gallery, Esther Schipper from Berlin and the Galerie Lelong from Paris, while the Paris and London-based Galerie Kamel Mennour, the Berlin-based Barbara Wien, and Clearing from New York and Brussels are making their debut this year at Art Cologne.

At Hall 11.2 Contemporary art
The Arcadia Missa Gallery (London) is focusing on, among others, the media artist Hannah Black. Her works closely interweave language, sound and image. BERG Contemporary (Reykjavik) is presenting works of the Dutch-born Kees Visser, who has found a new home in Iceland. With the young painter Benjamin Senior, BolteLang (Zurich) is showing an artist who captures the contemporary spirit in a classical painting method with egg tempera in the style of Fernand Léger or Oskar Schlemmer. With Awol Erizku, Ben Brown Fine Arts (London, Hong Kong) features a photographic artist who achieved widespread fame with an image of the pregnant singer Beyoncé and is known for reinterpreting Renaissance paintings with African or Afro-American models. Blain|Southern (London, Berlin) is presenting large-format photographs by the film director Wim Wenders, who also has been active as a photographer for some time.

With Wolfgang Tillmans, the Galerie Daniel Buchholz (Cologne, Berlin) has one of the greatest internationally celebrated contemporary photographic artists in its programme. Gisela Capitain (Cologne) contrasts works by Martin Kippenberger with those by the American photographer and conceptual artist Christopher Williams. The star of gallery Andrea Caratsch (St. Moritz) is the Swiss action and conceptual artist John Armleder. The Charim gallery (Vienna) is bringing, among others, works by the Georgian artist Tamuna Sirbiladze. The wife of Franz West painted with big, expressive gestures on mostly monumental canvases.

For its first appearance at Art Cologne, Clearing (New York) has selected, among other works, sculptures by Eduardo Paolozzi, one of the most innovative artists of British postwar modern art whose sculptural works move along the interface of human being and machine. Gagosian’s booth, “Untitled (Skulptur)”, confronts the viewer with a group of artificial bodies: human and animal; hyperreal and abstract. The gallery is showing a bronze figure by Alberto Giacometti, while at the centre of the booth is Duane Hanson’s startling Window Washer (1984), a hyperrealistic male figure in contrapposto, flannel shirt open, holding a longhandled window squeegee. Chris Burden’s Sex Tower (an architectural model of a 125-foot-high Sex Tower) (1986) proposes an erect gilded monument to coital union, while Urs Fischer's Marsupiale (2017), a full-size wax candle, depicts a man in a suit, embraced by a huge bust of a saint. The Erika Déak Gallery (Budapest) is focusing on Attila Szücs, whose idiosyncratic pictorial inventions are based on photographs. Delmes & Zander (Cologne), which specialises in outsider art, will show works of the Czech photographer Miroslav Tichy, who, from the 1960s on, took thousands of photos of women and girls on the street with his homemade cameras. Works by Stella Hamberg, Tim Eitel and Martin Eder are among the in-demand pieces presented by the gallery Eigen+ Art (Berlin, Leipzig). With Arthur Löwen and Laura Schawelka, fiebach, minninger (Cologne) is introducing two young talents. The Konrad Fischer gallery (Düsseldorf) is showing new works of Scottish artist, Jim Lambie, who works with coloured vinyl strips.

With the painter Alicia Viebrock, Bärbel Grässlin (Frankfurt) has a young artist in its programme who makes use of unconventional materials and methods for her gestural, intuitive and powerful painting. With Larry Bell, Mary Heilmann and Takesada Matsutani, Hauser & Wirth (Zurich, London, New York, Los Angeles) brings together three very different artist personalities at its stand, all of whom share an interest in geometric abstraction. Bell became known for his sophisticated treatment of glass surfaces and its light, reflection and shadow effects. He is represented at ART COLOGNE with glass sculptures and works on paper. Heilmann, one of the leading representatives of contemporary abstract painting, is showing work from the last three decades, including Little Red Boxes. Matsutani, a member of the Gutai group, long experimented with vinyl glue in combination with graphite.

Gallery Max Hetzler (Berlin, Paris) presents the Norwegian artist Ida Ekblad, as well as the sculptor Inge Mahn, who works almost exclusively with plaster. Kadel Willborn (Düsseldorf) shows the versatile American artist Barbara Kasten, who was only discovered internationally at a late date. Gallery Kleindienst (Leipzig) is focusing on graduates of the Leipzig Academy of Arts such as Henriette Grahnert, Julius Hoffmann and Christoph Ruckhäberle. Established artists like Alex Katz and Tony Cragg will be juxtaposed by the gallery Bernd Klüser (Munich) with Lori Nix, who creates miniature worlds in meticulous works, which she then documents by camera. The star at the stand of the gallery Christine Koenig (Vienna) is the photographer Jürgen Teller, whose images stage actresses like Charlotte Rampling or Beatrice-Dalle-like figures in a "Tableau vivant". The Koenig gallery (Berlin) shows new sculptures from Alicja Kwade. The Eleni Koroneou Gallery (Athens) contrasts two painters from different generations and traditions with works by Helmut Middendorf and Alex Hubbard. Kraupa-Tuskany Zeidler (Berlin) will show works of the artist collective “Slavs and Tatars”. With Sylvie Fleury, the gallery Lange + Pult (Zurich) features an important feminist artists in its programme.

Christian Lethert (Cologne) juxtaposes established artists such as Lutz Fritsch and Imi Knoebel with the young Natascha Schmitten, who composes her works from countless semi-transparent layers of paint. For its ART COLOGNE debut, Lisson Gallery (London) is presenting Shirazeh Houshiary, who, with Tony Cragg, Richard Deacon and others, belongs to the group of “New British Sculpture”. Gallery Löhrl (Mönchengladbach) is coming with a fire gouache of Otto Piene from the year 1975, as well as with a colourful bronze from Stephan Balkenhol. Gió Marconi (Milan) represents the versatile German artist Kerstin Brätsch and will show new works by Oliver Osborne. Daniel Marzona (Berlin) is showing new material images from Olaf Holzapfel, which consist of straw and cacti fibres.

Mario Mazzoli (Berlin) presents Céleste Boursier-Mougenot, who sets spaces into poetic motion with his interventions, as well as works by Nicola de Maria, one of the most important contemporary painters in Italy. Gallery nächst St. Stephan Rosemarie Schwarzwälder (Vienna) presents works by Katharina Grosse, Caitlin Lonegan and Günter Umberg, amongst others. Gallery Nagel/Draxler (Cologne, Berlin) is featuring Heimo Zobernig. Carolina Nitsch (New York) will be coming with the convolute Ode á l' Oubli by Louise Bourgeois. The gallery Vera Munro (Hamburg) will be bringing Imi Knoebel's important work Transit (1988), while another area of focus is on Günther Förg. Nanzuka (Tokyo) presents the versatile artist Hajime Sorayama, renowned for his provocative series of “Sexy Robots”.

Gallery Neu (Berlin) concentrates on the painter Birgit Megerle, whose feminist portraits are based on staged photos. The focus of the Pearl Lam Gallery (Hong Kong) is on the British painter Ged Quinn, whose allegorical images painted in the technique of the Old Masters contain art historical citations, as well as modern allusions and references. The highlight at Giorgio Persano (Turin) is a four-metre-long mixed media piece by Mario Merz from 1985. With Bogomir Ecker, the gallery Rupert Pfab (Düsseldorf) is juxtaposing this established artist with the complex works of Lars Breuer, who redefines spaces with a self-designed typography. Petra Rinck (Düsseldorf) presents the brilliantly colourful paintings composed of pigments by the Graubner student Jörg Stoya.

Thaddaeus Ropac (Salzburg, Paris) has a work of the artist duo Gilbert & George on offer. Philipp von Rosen (Cologne) will present works by Cody Choi, who represented Korea in 2017 at the Biennale di Venezia. With Francois Morellet and Maurizio Nannuci, Nicolaus Ruzicska (Salzburg) is presenting works by two light artists at its stand. At Deborah Schamoni (Munich), the large-format, figurative-abstract paintings of the Irish artist Aileen Murphy are sure to draw attention gazes with their floating bodies shown in twisted poses. Murphy’s practice is based on a dialogue with the Conditio Humana and her paintings will be juxtaposed with sculptures by Judith Hopf.

Gallery Anke Schmidt offers new works of the New York-based David Reed, who is one of the most important representatives of abstract painting in the USA. Gallery Rüdiger Schöttle (Munich) is celebrating its 50-year existence with works of the Chinese artist Chen Wei, who creates stage-like settings with strong light effects, and with works by Thomas Ruff, for whom the gallery organised his first solo exhibition in 1981. The photo artist is showing his “Negatives” series. Sprüth Magers (Berlin, London, Los Angeles) is presenting, among other works, a painting by Thomas Scheibitz, whose work is currently being shown at the Kunstmuseum Bonn in a major exhibition. With Günter Fruhtrunk, Rupprecht Geiger and Sean Scully, the Walter Storms gallery (Munich) features prominent contemporary abstract painting and will also present paintings by the Leipzig painter Peter Krauskopf, fresh from the studio. Vartai (Vilnius) is debuting at Art Cologne with photographs by the artist duo Svajone and Paulius Stanikas. Gallery Wentrup (Berlin) has announced works by the renowned sculptor Olaf Metzel. With Antony Gormley, White Cube (London) also represents a prominent sculpture position. Zilberman Gallery (Istanbul, Berlin) presents Guido Casaretto, who experiments with the most varied materials to make the work processes visible. David Zwirner (New York) will showcase a painting of the high profile shooting star Oscar Murillo.