Alf Lechner

Material als Akteur
Alf Lechner Stiftung

Celebrating the Steel Sculptor’s Centennial

Alf Lechner (b. Munich, 1925; d. Obereichstätt, Bavaria, 2017) was one of Germany’s most renowned sculptors. He began experimenting with steel in the 1950s and developed a distinctive abstract formal idiom. International museums started acquiring his works for their collections after 1974, when the Berlin Academy of Arts honored him with its Berliner Kunstpreis; numerous artist’s residencies, professorships, appointments, and accolades followed, culminating in the Federal Cross of Merit. His multifaceted oeuvre encompasses over 800 sculptures, a far larger number of maquettes, and over 4,500 drawings, some in large formats, as well as pastel and oil paintings.

The monograph Material als Akteur is dedicated to Lechner’s sculptural practice and sustained engagement with physical matter and materiality. Offering insight into the widely overlooked infrastructural and economic dimensions of art-making, a comprehensive study by Dominik Bais frames a production-aesthetic perspective on the oeuvre. Plate sections with previously unpublished photographs and notes round out the volume.