Premio Combat Prize

REGINA NIEKE – Artwork description (by Joachim Becker)
The human being is central. Not an individual personality, but personhood itself. Life (movement) and Death (standstill), Being and Time are the grand themes of Regina Nieke. The embryonic as a description of individual and social conditions,
and of the longing for a liberating resurrection, for the upright path in the
here and now.
Regina Niekeʼs paintings tell of the human struggle to give meaning to oneʼs life on
the way to self-fulfilment – without a mask, naked. To be or not!
The creature, naked and helpless, is a symbol for the suffering that reality brings – a
thin skin shows emotional depth, feelings about the world, the experience of being
wounded. In painterly compression, Regina Nieke portrays the rape of the individual
essence, brings to light the desire for passionate merger, for love – the act of love as
the ʻlittle deathʼ (Georges Bataille, The Tears of Eros). Differentiated colourations are
the atmospheric transmitters of a message.
Poetically and ecstatically, in voluminous streams of colour, Regina Nieke articulates
the drive to survive, emotions, instinctive perception, and demands their evolutionary
(self-)gratification. She reflects narcissistic woundings, and reclaims a guilt-free
identity and the recognition of extraneously determined compulsions.
Her figures, focused in the centre of the canvas, are placeless. Enclosed colourspaces
with no way out are confronted by horizontally divided backgrounds, divided
skies, light–dark. Transitions of consciousness–unconsciousness, anima–animus,
mind–spirit formulate the need for harmony.
The human body, whether turning its back to the viewer, its fragile spine exposed
under a welter of paint, or floating in fairy-like transparency, immaterially portraying
the existential cry for fulfilment, is the expression of an idea. Regina Nieke unites the
achievements of abstract expressionism, colour-field painting and neo-expressionist
figuration in her work. She refers to both Goya and Bacon while radically, subjectively
and authentically asserting her own power of aesthetic expression. Her painting
visualises the urge to immediacy and – the naked truth.
In the seductively colourful beauty of her paintings lie the eternal human contradictions, conflicts and desires.
April 2013
BIOGRAPHY
1979 Born in Germany
Lives and works in Berlin

2010 Post-Graduate Degree, UdK, Berlin
2008 Graduate Degree, UdK, Berlin
2004 Studies Painting in the class of Prof. Burkhard Held and Prof. Robert Lucander, University of the Arts (UdK), Berlin

2006 Graduate Designer, UdK, Berlin
2001 Studies Industrial Design at the University of the Arts (UdK), in the class of Vivienne Westwood amongst others
SCHOLARSHIP
2011-2012 Dorothea Konwiarz Scholarship
Since 2011 Promotion for a studio (ongoing)
2009 Studio Scholarship of Rudolf-Schweitzer-Cumpana Foundation in Bucharest, Romania
SOLO EXHIBITIONS (Selection)
2013
Vom Geist der Bilder, Gallery Anke Zeisler, Berlin/ Germany (12.6. 2013 - 24.7. 2013)
NAKED, Kommunale Gallery, Berlin/ Germany (24.5. 2013 - 30.6. 2013)
2012
Untitled, Gallery Collectiva, Berlin/ Germany
Insomnia, Dorothea Konwiarz Foundation, Berlin/ Germany
Face to Face,Gallery Hans Tepe, Damme/ Germany

2011
Werkschau, Infernoesque. Project Space, Berlin/ Germany

2010
UPDATE art 2010, Partner of Art Forum, University of the Arts (UdK), Berlin/ Germany
animal urbanum, Church St. Marien, Frankfurt (Oder)/ Germany
I Can’t Get No Satisfaction, Gallery Hans Tepe, Damme/ Germany

2008
New York Paintings, Gallery Miope, Berlin/ Germany

GROUP EXHIBITIONS (Selection)
2013
Interferenzen, Warsaw/ Poland (upcoming)
JUNGE POSITIONEN: Kapitel II/Berlin, Bern/ Switzerland (17.4. 2013 - 25.5. 2013)
2012
ALL CONNECTIONS WILL BE REACHED, Kreuzberg Pavillon, Berlin/ Germany
JUST MAD MIA, Contemporary Art Fair, Miami/ USA
Out of Context: Female Artists from Germany, Beers.Lambert
Contemporary, London/ UK
Nominee Exhibition ”Losito Kunstpreis’12”, Großes Waisenhaus,
Potsdam/ Germany
Bring a Brick, Infernoesque, Berlin/ Germany
ARTESANTANDER XXI, Edition of Santander’s International
Fair of Contemporary Art, Spain
Artvilnius’12, Third International Contemporary Art Fair, Lithuania
after the sunset, Galerie Collectiva, Berlin/ Germany
Swab 2012. International Contemporary Art Fair, Barcelona/ Spain
New Perspectives in Painting, Junge Kunst Berlin/ Germany
Religio, Church St. Marien, Frankfurt (Oder)/ Germany
Vierunddreißig zu Kleist, urban Gallery Speyer/ Germany
2011
private, private, Gallery Collectiva, Berlin/ Germany
WATCHLIST 11, Junge Kunst Berlin/ Germany
MULTIPLIED Contemporary Editions Fair, London
Gegenständlich - ungegenständlich, Dorothea Konwiarz Foundation, Berlin/Germany
Vierunddreißig zu Kleist, Church St. Marien, Frankfurt (Oder), and Gallery Alte Schule, Berlin/ Germany
Transgression, Beers.Lambert Contemporary, London
Junge Kunst, municipal Gallery, Petershagen (Minden)/ Germany
MEETING POINT, Forum Kunst&Architektur, Essen/ Germany

2010
Silly Gooses Live in The Dark, UF6 Projects, Berlin/ Germany
F.F.E., Gallery Hans Tepe, Damme/ Germany
Masterstudentreward, University of the Arts (UdK), Berlin/ Germany
Watchlist, Junge Kunst Berlin temporary/ Germany
now open for off season. Endzeiten in der Gegenwartskunst, Fichtebunker Berlin/ Germany
MEETING POINT, Kommunale Gallery, Berlin/ Germany
QUO VADIS?, Gallery Alte Schule, Berlin/ Germany

2009
Foxtrott Saxonia, Kunsthalle, Dresden/ Germany
Querschläge, Gallery Ludwig, Oberhausen/ Germany
Watchlist ’09, Junge Kunst Berlin temporary/ Germany
Generationen zwanzig deutsche Jahre, Kunsthalle Brennabor in Brandenburg/Havel/ Germany
Energy II. Berlin-Essen, Kommunale Gallery, Berlin/ Germany
HELDENHAFT, Auto-i-DAT AG, Zürich/ Swiss
6. BerlinerKunstsalon, Art Fair, Junge Kunst Berlin/ Germany
Große Herbstausstellung, Gallery Kwadrat, Berlin/ Germany
Watchlist | 10, Junge Kunst Berlin temporary/ Germany

2008
30 gegen 3 000 000. Skulptur und Malerei aus Berlin, Schloss Holte Stukenbrock, Bielefeld/ Germany
Show down!, Gallery Michael Schultz, Berlin/ Germany
Energy I. Berlin-Essen, Zollverein, Essen/ Germany
On Fire, Gallery Miope, Berlin/ Germany
Fremdgehen, Burg Giebichenstein, Halle/S./ Germany
PUBLICATIONS
2012
Catalogue of Groupshow Out of Context, Beers.Lambert London
2011
Catalogue of Groupshow Transgression, Beers.Lambert London
Catalogue of Groupshow Vierunddreißig zu Kleist, kunst projekte e.v.and
Kleist-Museum Frankfurt/ Oder (ed.)

2010
Catalogue of Groupshow now open for off season. Endzeiten in der Gegenwartskunst,
Fichtebunker Berlin/ Germany

2009
Catalogue of Groupshow Foxtrott Saxonia, Kunsthalle Dresden(ed.) / Germany
Catalogue of Groupshow Energy II. Berlin-Essen, Kommunale Gallery Berlin/ Germany

PRESS
”Catching my Eye”, Hymie Dunn, Eastlondonarttours, on the occasion of group exhibition Out of Context, London 2012/ UK
”Schock und Ernüchterung”, Gallery Hans Tepe, Oldenburgische Volkszeitung, on the occasion of solo exhibition Face to Face, Damme 2012/ Germany
”Moment der Demontage”, Tom Mustroph, Neues Deutschland, on the occasion of group exhibition WATCHLIST 11, Berlin 2011/ Germany

”Grenzgebiete künstlerisch erkundet”, Ralf Kapries, Mindener Tageblatt, on the occasion of group exhibition Junge Kunst, Petershagen 2011/ Germany

”Diese Kunst, so jung”, Hartmut Kelm, Der Oderlandspiegel and
”Bilder einer Großstadt”, Anja Hamm, Märkische Oderzeitung, on the occasion of solo exhibition animal urbanum, Frankfurt (Oder) 2011/ Germany
”Gipfeltreffen im Labor”, Angela Hohmann, taz, on the occasion of group exhibition Meeting Point, Berlin 2010/ Germany
”Regina Nieke/ I can’t get no satisfaction”, Gallery Hans Tepe, Monopol and
”Regina Nieke stellt aus”, Gallery Hans Tepe, Oldenburgische Volkszeitung, on the occasion of solo exhibition I can’t get no satisfaction, Damme 2010/ Germany
”Der Kunstsommer beginnt”, Gudrun Mattern, WAZ Oberhausen, on the occasion of group exhibition Querschläge, Galerie Ludwig, Schloss Oberhausen 2009/ Germany
”WATCHLIST 09”, JungeKunstBerlin, Berliner Zeitung, on the occasion of group exhibition WATCHLIST 09, Berlin 2009/ Germany