ALFRED KREN

“The Decay of Beauty. The Beauty of Decay.” - 4000 years of art.

Gallery version for Colnaghi London. Catalogue with essay by Alfred Kren.

October 9 - November 8, 2024

“The Decay of Beauty. The Beauty of Decay” - 5000 years of art.

Museum project in progress since 2014

"Out of Africa: An Important Selection of Historic African Ceramics and Textiles from Private Collections in Europe and Texas"

Exhibition shown at the Pollock Gallery, Division of Art, Meadows School of the Arts, Southern Methodist University, Dallas

November 1 - December 4, 2010

catalogue with texts by Dr. Maria Kecskési and Georges Meurant

Curator in association with The Norwood Gallery LLC d/b/a Norwood Fine Arts, 1999-2009.

“Twentieth-Century Master Drawings: Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Kasimir Malevich, André Masson, Wassily Kandinsky, Richard Hamilton, Robert Rauschenberg, and Alberto Giacometti.” and “Nok:  A major group of ancient terracotta sculptures from Nigeria.”

Exhibitions shown at the The Norwood Gallery, Austin, Texas, 17 September – 23 October 1999.

“Robert Wilson:  Time Rocker, 1996 – Selected Drawings”. and “Nurimono:  Selected Lacquer Objects by Contemporary Japanese Masters”

(Co-curated with Catherine Craft).

Exhibitions shown at The Norwood Gallery, Austin, Texas, 29 October – 27 November 1999. 

“Otto Schoefft, Egyptian and Moroccan Motifs:  A rare group of 16 albumen prints from the 1880’s.” and “Traditional African Ceramics:  Akan, Makonde, Mangbetu”

(Co-curated with Catherine Craft).

Exhibitions shown at The Norwood Gallery, Austin, Texas, 3 December 1999 – 15 January 2000.

“Icons and Masks:  Photographs of Artists from Picasso to Rauschenberg together with tribal masks from British Columbia, Congo, and Cameroon.”

Exhibition shown at The Norwood Gallery, Austin, Texas, 4 February – 4 March 2000.

“Sigmar Polke, Arnulf Rainer, Gerhard Richter:  Three Important Paintings from the 1980s.”

Exhibition shown at The Norwood Gallery, Austin, Texas, 10 March – 15 April 2000.

“Erwin Pfrang:  Paintings, Watercolors & Drawings from 1985 to 1998”

(Co-curated with Catherine Craft).

Exhibition shown at The Norwood Gallery, Austin, Texas, 28 April – 10 June 2000.

“Kazimir Malevich, Nikolai Suetin, Ilya Chashnik: Drawings & Watercolors from 1913 to 1930.”

(Co-curated with Catherine Craft)

Exhibition shown at The Norwood Gallery, Austin, Texas, September 7 – 30, 2000.

“Barry Le Va:  Selected Drawings, 1982-1998”

(Co-curated with Catherine Craft).

Exhibition shown at The Norwood Gallery, Austin, Texas, October 7 – November 4, 2000.

“Marcel Duchamp, Richard Hamilton, Dieter Roth, Jasper Johns:  Important Prints & One Multiple.”

Exhibition shown at The Norwood Gallery, Austin, Texas, November 9 – December 9, 2000.

“The Visible and the Unseen:  African Tribal Art & 20th-Century European Drawings and Watercolours.”

Exhibition shown at The Leonard Hutton Galleries, New York, New York, November – December 2000.

“Shu Eguchi:  4 Sculptures from 1979 to 1986” and “Bakuba Textiles of Zaire.”

(Co-curated with Catherine Craft).

Exhibitions shown at The Norwood Gallery, Austin, Texas, March 9 – April 6, 2001.

“African Tribal Art & 20th-Century European Work.”

Exhibition shown at The Leonard Hutton Galleries, New York, New York, November 2001 – January 2002

“Erwin Pfrang:  Paintings & Drawings 1983-2001.”

Exhibition shown at Robert Courtoy, Brussels, Belgium, March 14 – April 13, 2002.

“Drawing Into Painting: Nancy Diamond, Trenton Doyle Hancock, Al Taylor.”

Exhibition shown at Galerie Charles Schumann, Munich, Germany. November 22 – December 21, 2002.

“MNEMOSYNE: Drawings from 1912 to 1960 by Kazimir Malevich, André Masson, Julio Gonzalez, Alberto Giacometti, Joseph Beuys and Jean Dubuffet” in dialogue with sculptures from Black Africa and pre-Columbia

Norwood Fine Arts, Munich, Germany, 29 October – 29 November 2003

“BORORO: Coil-sewn discs of the Oukari and Woodabé tribes from the Faro region on the border of Nigeria and Cameroon”

Norwood Fine Arts, Munich, Germany, July 1 through 15, 2004

“ANDRÉ MASSON – ANTONIUS HÖCKELMANN: Bronzes from 1941 through 1964,”

Norwood Fine Arts, Munich, Germany, October 14 through November 6, 2004

“ATLAS – World Cultures in Dialogue.”

HVB Kunst Palais and Norwood Fine Arts, both Munich, Germany, October 6 through 22, 2005 (catalogue)

“The Desire of the Line: Drawings by Pierre Bonnard, Edouard Vuillard, Frantisek Kupka, Kazimir Malevich, Juan Gris, André Masson, Salvador Dali, Paul Delvaux, Jean Dubuffet and Joseph Beuys” and “Selected Sculptures from Black Africa, Oceania and pre-Columbia”

Norwood Fine Arts, Munich, Germany, May 30 through June 23, 2006

“Among the Deathless: Over-modeled Oceanic skulls and photographic artist's portraits.” (catalogue)

(in collaboration with Collection Klewan and Expoca) and “Oceania: Masks, Dance wands and Sculptures”

Norwood Fine Arts, Munich, Germany, April 26 through May 19, 2007

“Erwin Pfrang: large format works in ink on rice paper mounted on linen 2005 - 2007”

(in conjunction with Galerie Fred Jahn, Munich)

Norwood Fine Arts, Munich, Germany, May 30 through June 23, 2007

“Egypt in 19th century photographs by Abdullah Freres, Antonio Beato, Emile Brugsch, J. Pascal Sebah, C. & G. Zangaki.” (catalogue)

Exhibition of Norwood Fine Arts at Galerie Harmakhis, Brussels, Belgium

June 8 through 13, 2007

“Karl Schmid: Topoi - Steel Sculptures 1975 - 2007”

(in conjunction with Galerie Florian Walch, Munich)

Norwood Fine Arts, Munich, Germany, November 13 through 29, 2007

“Anke Doberauer: Painting 2007 - 2008”

(in conjunction with the 200th anniversary of the Academy of Fine Arts, Munich and in co-operation with Galerie Fred Jahn)

Norwood Fine Arts, Munich, Germany, November 13 through 29, 2008

“American Drawings: Justin Almquist, Stephen Ellis, Robert Feintuch, Trenton Doyle Hancock, Greg Kwiatek, Charles LeDray, Al Taylor, John Newman, Robert Wilson, Joe Zucker”

Norwood Fine Arts, Munich, Germany, December 5 through 20, 2008

“Justin Almquist: Selected Drawings 2002 - 2009 & Recent Paintings” (catalogue)

Norwood Fine Arts, Munich, Germany, November 15 through December 12, 2009

Curator in association with The Austin Art Consortium, Inc., 1994-1997.

Robert Rauschenberg:  “Haywire / Major Technological Works from the 1960s.”

Exhibition and catalogue conceived by Alfred Kren and organised by Alfred Kren and Cornelia Faist.  

Exhibition shown at the Aktionsforum Praterinsel, Munich, Germany, 22 March – 19 May 1997.

“Robert Rauschenberg Room” (containing“Vault”, 1962, “Scanning”, 1963, “Carnival (Gluts)”, 1986, “Balcone Glut (Neapolitan)”, 1987,

“Holiday Ruse (Night Shades)”, 1991, ”Jungle Watch (Borealis)”, 1991) 

conceived and organised by Alfred Kren and Dr. Carla Schulz-Hoffmann

Staatsgalerie Moderner Kunst, Munich, September 1994

Independent curator, 1995-1996.

“Boliw:  Shrine Figures of the Bamana, Mali.”

Conceived and organised for the Peter Blum Gallery, New York.  Exhibition shown there 22 June – 5 October 1996.

Andreas Horlitz:  “Lexicon.”

Exhibition and catalogue conceived by Alfred Kren and Andreas Horlitz.  

Exhibition shown at the Sprengel Museum, Hannover, Germany, 14 May – 25 August 1996.

[For exhibition catalogue, see Publications]

Independent curator, 1979 – 1984.

“Sun and Steel:  New European – American Work.”

Franz Hitzler, Leiko Ikemura, Greg Kwiatek, François Morelli,  Amy Purcell, Charles Saulson, and Troels Wörsel.

Exhibition shown 17 May – 16 June 1984 at Serra di Felice, The Puck Building, New York.

[catalogue, see Publications]

Germany After 1945.

Planned by The American Federation of Arts, New York in 1982.

[Never realised due to lack of funding.]

“Drawing Distinctions:  American Drawings of the Seventies,” 1980-81.

Richard Artschwager, Jon Borofsky, Linda Francis, Robert Grosvenor, Will Insley, Barry Le Va, Bill Lundberg, Gordon Matta-Clark, Bruce Nauman, Stephen Rosenthal, Fred Sandback, Joel Shapiro, Paul Sharits, Keith Sonnier, Paul Thek, James Turrell, Richard Tuttle, William Wegman, Robert Wilson.

Exhibition shown at the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Denmark; Kunsthalle Basel, Switzerland; Städtische Galerie im Lenbachhaus, Munich; Wilhelm-Hack-Museum, Ludwigshafen.

[catalogue, see publications]

“New American Video”, 1981.

Featuring the work of David Bowie, Nam June Paik, Talking Heads, Robert Wilson, and others.

Exhibition shown at the Kunsthaus Zürich, Switzerland.

“New York Video”, 1980.

Featuring the work of Jenny Holzer, John Sanborn, Bill Viola, Gary Hill and others.  

Exhibition shown at the Lenbachhaus Munich, Germany and the Kunsthaus Zürich, Switzerland.

William Copley:  Thirty Years of Drawings, 1979.

Exhibition held at the Galerie Renate Fassbender, Munich Germany.