Bill Bollinger

The Fruitmarket Gallery is proud to present this major exhibition of the work of American artist Bill Bollinger (1939–1988), one of the most important artists of the 1960s. A work of art historical rediscovery as well as an exhibition of great power and beauty, it brings an artist once mentioned in the same breath as Bruce Nauman, Robert Smithson, Eva Hesse and Fred Sandback back for serious reconsideration.

Bollinger's work is characterised by his sensitive use of the idiosyncrasies and possibilities offered by technical and industrial materials. His use of aluminium pipes, rope, rubber hoses, chain-link fencing, lightbulbs and wheelbarrows is as radical and direct as it is elegant, exploiting physical laws such as gravity, balance, and the intrinsic properties of water. His sculpture, created in the 1960s at the height of the space race, has an astonishing energy and power, even today.

The exhibition brings together major sculptures and drawings by Bollinger, including most of his existing works from collections in Europe and America, and careful reconstructions of lost works from his celebrated solo exhibitions, and from his participation in iconic group exhibitions from the late 1960s in New York. It provides the first ever overview of Bollinger's brief, but extremely intense, artistic career, and provides an opportunity to rediscover the radical practice of this exceptional artist who, in his own words, was 'not interested in the aesthetics of form but the fact of form'; who considered his work 'not as primarily expressive through form but declarative through state'.

Organised by Kunstmuseum Liechtenstein in collaboration with The Fruitmarket Gallery. Exhibition supported by The Henry Moore Foundation.

Bill Bollinger was born in Brooklyn, New York on 15 July 1939 and died 26 May 1988 (aged 48).

This is the first retrospective exhibition of Bill Bollinger's work. It is curated by Christiane Meyer-Stoll (Kunstmuseum Liechtenstein) in conceptual collaboration with Rolf Ricke, in a joint production with the Kunstmuseum Liechtenstein, the ZKM Centre for Art and Media, Karlsruhe and The Fruitmarket Gallery.

Bill Bollinger
Kuratoren: Christiane Meyer-Stoll, Rolf Ricke