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2025

Pedro Cera, Lisbon, Portugal (forthcoming)
ARCH, Athens, Greece (forthcoming)
Bortolami, New York, USA (forthcoming)
Thomas Schulte Galerie, Berlin, Germany (forthcoming)

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2025

Lena Henke: In Conversation with Paulina Pobocha

―Topical Cream

Ersatzteile für Körper

―Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung

2024

Wrecking Ball

―Family Style

From the City to the Kitchen and back

―Sammlung Stadler

“It’s All Fear, No?”: Lena Henke,
in Conversation With Urs Fischer

―Interview Magazine

2023

Lena Henke “Good Year” at MARTa Herford

―MOUSSE

Kein Pferdefuß? Lena Henke im Marta Herford

―KunstArztPraxis

Lena Henke über The Critic Laughs von Richard Hamilton

―Monopol Magazin

Feature for The Museum Issue

―SPIKE

2022

Auf dem Asphalt botanisieren gehen

―Exberliner

2021

Beneath the
Pavement

―Carina Bukuts

―Frieze

Werkstoffarchiv

―Stiftung Sitterwerk

Lena Henke Artist Feature

―Tique Magazin

Lena Henke: Alice im Pferdestall

―Wiener Zeitung

2020

Lena Henke Sculpts the Surreal From the Mundane

― Bárbara Borges de Campos

―Frieze

Lena Henke: Ice to Gas

―Cristina Sanchez-Kozyreva

―Contemporânea

Learning From Doxiadis: Object Lessons in Athens

―Despina Zefkili

―Ocula

Es herrscht Hochsaison in Münchens Kunstwelt. Ein Rundgang zu interessanten Ausstellungen in Galerien

―Evelyn Vogel

―Süddeutsche Zeitung

On the Weekends That Were – Munich, Zurich, and Berlin

―Colin Lang

―Spike Magazine

Review: Various Others

―Carina Bukuts

―Frieze

In München mit voller Kraft voraus

―Brita Sachs

―Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung

Review: Various Others

―İşçi Sınıfının Sanatları

―Arts of the Working Class

Here’s a first look at Rockefeller Center’s major new sculpture installation

―Shaye Weaver

―Time Out New York

Frieze Sculpture to Return to the Rockefeller Center Later This Year

―Jack Stanley

―Hyperbeast

Frieze Sculpture at Rockefeller Center Cultivates an Urban Garden with Mighty Artworks

―Stephanie Sporn

―Galerie

Free outdoor sculpture garden opens at Rockefeller Center

―Devin Gannon

―6sqft

Artists As Mapmakers:
Lena Henke Interviewed by Owen Duffy

―Owen Duffy

―Bomb Magazine

2019

Keine Frauensache

―Vivien Trommer

―Welt

See Lena Henke: Germanic Artifacts

―Jerry Saltz

―Vulture

2018

Casting Call: Lena Henke’s Sculptures Propose New Manners of Dwelling and Co-Existence

―Laura McLean-Ferris

―Frieze

Zooms

―Tenzing Barshee

―Flash Art

Lena Henke behauptet, sie sei eine klassische bildhauerin. Kann sein.  Aber das sagt noch längst nicht alles

―Elke Buhr

―Monopol

Interview: Opening--Lena Henke at Emanuel Layr

―Max L. Feldman

―Spike Magazine

Lena Henke at Kunsthalle Zürich

―Julia Moritz

―Topical Cream

Positioner at Mathew Marks, November 2018

―Sarah Bay Gachot

―Contemporary Art Review Los Angeles

2017

SI: Visions: Lena Henke on AutoCartography

―Laura McLean-Ferris

―Swiss Institute

A Permanent Plinth for New Art Coming to the High Line

―Randy Kennedy

―The New York Times

Will a Giant Boob or Chameleon Inaugurate the High Line’s New Public Art Plinth?

―Claire Voon

―Hyperallergic

The High Line announces a new major stage for sculpture on the park's new section

―Sarah Boyle

―The Architect's Newspaper

Plinth

―The High Line

New York to get its own Fourth Plinth competition on the High Line

―Victoria Stapley-Brown

―The Art Newspaper

Der Entwurf einer Skulptur von Lena Henke ist nominiert, das neueste künstlerische Vorhaben der New Yorker High Line zu zieren

―Vivien Trommer

―Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt

Lena Henke und Cosima von Bonin für Gestaltung "High Line" im Rennen

―Monopol

Leise rieselt der Sand und die Gedanken

―Von Christian Huther

―Frankfurter Neue Presse

Artforum Critics' Pick

―Vivien Trommer

―Artforum

Sand im Kunstgetriebe: Lena Henke hat für die Rotunde der Frankfurter Schirn eine Raumskulptur geschaffen. Und damit die ganz große Metaphern-Truhe geöffnet.

―Von Michael Hierholzer

―Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitun

Stipendiatin Lena Henke

―Hessische Kultur Stiftung

Fantasy / Private as Public: Lena Henke in conversation with Penny Rafferty

― Penny Rafferty

New Fantasies of Modernism

―Aria Dean

―Cura Magazine

Die Brüste auf der Brüstung und andere Kunstüberraschungen zum Nulltarif

―Tages Woche

2016

Lena Henke at Real Fine Arts

―Sam Korman

―Art in America

Lena Henke: Heartbreak Highway

―Laura McLean-Ferris

―Topical Cream

Lena Henke: Heartbreak Highway

―Laura McLean-Ferris

―Spike

Lena Henke, “Heartbreak Highway” at Real Fine Art

―Kaleidoscope

Into the Void: On Spring Shows of Empty, Charged Spaces , and Raw, Rough-and-Tumble Sculpture in New York

―Andrew Russeth

―ArtNews

Around Town: Basel
Three new exhibitions from Lena Henke, Yngve Holen, and Anne Imhof

―Laura McLean-Ferris

―Frieze

Galerienfestival "Curated by" in Wien
Auf den Spuren der Vergangenheit

―Moritz Gaudlitz

―Monopol

Fantasy // Private as Public: An Interview with Lena Henke

―Penny Rafferty

―Berlin Art Week

2015

In the Studio with Lena Henke

―Spike Magazine

Female Genius

―Amelia Stein

―PIN-UP Magazine

Dead Horse Bay Anna Gritz on Lena Henke

―Anna Gritz

―Cura Magazine

Top Ten

―Lena Henke

―Artforum

Off the Beaten Path

―Alexandra Pechman

―W Magazine

Art in the Dead of Winter

―Andre Russeth

―ArtNews

'Digital Bitches:' The New Museum Triennial

―Jerry Saltz

―Vulture: New York Magazine

In Venice, Plenty to See Beyond the Pavilions

―Kevin McGarry

―T Magazine

More than Venice can Handle: Off-site Events at the Biennale

―Jeppe Ugelvig

―Sleek

Where Virtual Equals Real

―Randy Kennedy

―The New York Times

Lena Henke and Max Brand

―Paige K. Bradley

―Artforum

A Three-day Show in Venice

―Andrew Russeth

―Artnews

Dealer Matt Moravec will open Chelsea-area Gallery

―Andrew Russeth

―Artnews

2015 New Museum Triennial

―Sam Pulitzer

―Artforum

2014

Lena Henke

―Julie Baumgardner

―W Magazine

Lena Henke at White Flag Projects

―Karen Butler

―Artforum

Street Smarts: Lena Henke's Work Is All Over Town This Frieze Week

―Andrew Russeth

―Observer

Lena Henke - Galerie Parisa Kind

―Vivien Trommer

―Kuba Paris

Lena Henke:
Abstraction turned impossibly concrete

―Pablo Larios

―Frieze

Street Material

―Judith Hopf

―Mousse

Star Material

―Biel Parklee

―W Magazine

Lena Henke: Yes, I'm Pregnant

―Lyndsy Welgos

―Topical Cream

Project 25/25/25

―Stefanie Schmidt-Juhr

―Kontur 10

Stray Dogs and City Streets Inspire Lena Henke’s Meditations on Public and Private Space

―Halley Johnson

―Artsy

2013

Abstraction turned impossibly concrete

―Pablo Larios

―Frieze

2012

Critics' Pick

―Jerry Saltz

―New York Magazine

Roh, pur und hart und vielleicht ein bisschen pervers

―Aachener Nachrichten

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Biography | CV

Lena Henke (born 1982 in Warburg (GER)). Henke has studied at the Frankfurter Städelschule under Professor Michael Krebber (2004-2010).

Lena Henke has developed a diverse body of sculptural works, often arranged in comprehensive spatial installations. Her interest in spaces is not limited to presentation or intervention in existing architecture; it is also revealed in a broader sense in the appropriation of objects, urban situations and psychological spatial constellations. Recurring motifs include interventions into the classic working methods of sculpture, recourse to anthroposophical methods, often through a biographically motivated approach or the control of "architecture". In her vocabulary of forms and materials numerous references such as Minimalism or Land Art can be found, which she likes to combine with surrealist motifs. In a subtle way and with a humorous undertone, Henke enjoys infiltrating the patriarchal structures of art history. She explores the ideas of urban planners, landscape architects and urban theorists such as Jane Jacobs, Roberto Burle Marx and Robert Moses. She takes up themes like interpersonal relationships, sexuality and fetishism. Using strategies of intervention, appropriation and control, the artist also examines her relationship to herself and her family environment.

Education

2010

Academy of Fine Arts, Städelschule, Frankfurt am Main MA with Professor Michael Krebber

2004-
2010

Academy of Fine Arts, Städelschule, Frankfurt am Main Contemporary Art, class of Professor Michael Krebber

2008-
2009

Master of Fine Art Multidisciplinary, Glasgow School of Art Scotland, as an Erasmus scholarship holder

Public Collections

Kunsthalle Bern, Bern, Switzerland
Kunsthalle Bielefeld, Bielefeld, Germany
MAMCO Museum, Geneva, Switzerland
MAK, Vienna, Austria
Sammlung Verbund, Wien, Austria
Socrates Sculpture Park, Long Island City, USA
Skulpturen Park, Köln, Germany
Skulpturenmuseum Glaskasten Marl, Germany
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, USA
Institute of Contemporary Art Miami, Florida
Hessel Museum of Art, Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, USA
Heidi Horten collection Vienna, Austria
Kunstsammlung des Bundes Bonn, Germany
Belvedere Museum, Vienna, Austria

Publications

2024

P7340LH Owner’s Manual Model ’82/2023

2022

I Don’t Love Berlin, Crazy City

2020

Lena Henke: My Fetish Years

2015

2010-2015

2014

Yes I’m pregnant!

2012

First Faces

Teaching Experience

2025

Visiting Artist Lecture
Academy of Fine Arts Nürnberg, Germany

2024

Guest Professor
Kunstuniversität Linz, Austria

2022

Visiting Artist Lecture, Academy of Fine Arts Munich, Germany

2021

Visiting Artist Lecture
Malmö Art Academy

Visting Artist Lecture
Staatliche Akademie der Künste Karlsruhe, Germany

Visiting Artist Lecture
University of Applied Arts, Vienna, Austria

2020

Visiting Artist Lecture
Jutland Art Academy in Arhus, Denmark

2019

Swiss Institute, Senior Class education program, New York, USA
Visting Aritt Lecture, Bard College Annabel on Hudson, New York, USA
Visiting Artist at De Ateliers in Amsterdam, Netherlands
Engadin Art Talk in Zuoz, Switzerland; A panel discussions led by Daniel Baumann (Director of the Kunsthalle Zurich), Bice Curiger (Artistic Director of the Fondation Vincent van Gogh Arles), Hans Ulrich Obrist (Artistic Director of the Serpentine Gallery in London) and Philip Ursprung (Professor for Art and Architectural History at the ETH Zurich).

2018

New Museum, Social Fabric: On Thomas Bayrle’s Expanded Network. A conversation with Alex Kitnick, Jacolby Satterwhite, and Jordan Wolfson. July 2018

Artist talk, Kunsthalle Zurich, Switzerland.

Visiting Artist Lecture, Sitterwerk St. Gallen, Switzerland.

Panel Conversation, Kunst und Kommerz, Trogen, Switzerland.

2017

BKM-Talks, Zürcher Hochschule der Künste ZHdK, Zurich, Switzerland

Artist talk, Kunsthalle Frankfurt, Germany.

Visiting Artist Lecture, Harvard University, Boston.

2016

Visiting Artist Lecture, Akademie der Kuenste, Mainz, Germany.

Visiting Artist Lecture, Akademie der Kuenste, Duesseldorf, Germany

2015

Visiting Artist Lecture, Department of Fine Arts, Pratt Institute, New York

Galleries

Bortolami Gallery New York
39 Walker Street
New York, NY 10013
USA
Contact: Claire Bergeal
claire@bortolamigallery.com

LAYR Vienna
Seilerstaette 2/26
1010 Vienna
Austria
Contact: Olivia Thurn-Valsassina
olivia@emanuellayr.com

Pedro Cera
Lisbon
Rua do Patrocínio, 67 E
1350-229 Lisboa
Portugal

Madrid
Calle de Barceló, 13
28004 Madrid, Spain
Contact: Markéta Stará Condeixa
marketa@pedrocera.com

17.03.―28.04.2018 Embrassade Fons Welters Full Text

17.03.―28.04.2018
Embrassade
Fons Welters
Amsterdam, Netherlands





For her exhibition Embrassade at Galerie Fons Welters, Lena Henke shows a selection of sculptures which all derive from an ongoing project, Geburt und Familie that started in 2014.

These bright colored sculptures look like enlarged children’s drawings. They hark back to Rudolf Steiner’s charcoal drawings, which are to be seen as a notation of his doctrine. This is the notion that drawings you make before your seventh birthday form the fundament for all later developments in life. The shapes of the sculptures in this series all relate, often directly, to the human body: there is an ovum, a blood cell, and a white eye on view. The things depicted cause an odd kind of intimacy and simultaneous awkwardness, especially in combination with their titles that often hint at certain emotional and physical attachment. 

The elegant, see through sculptures have outstanding material qualities. Henke especially developed fiberglass rope, a material which did not yet exist, to be able to ‘draw in space’. Because she made the sculptures on the floor of her studio, all kinds of traces of the studio floor can be found on the backside of the sculptures. The qualities of both the material and making process are important: the resulting frayed edges are due to a self-made production process. This is an important aspect of Henke’s practice, as well as the development from 2D to 3D and the energetic and esoteric processes during the creation of the sculptures.

Striking is that they are placed within a grid which covers both floor and walls of the gallery space.  Where Steiner let his emotional research take place through drawings, Bert Hellinger invented the so-called family placing method. Here, you are asked to place ‘stand-ins’ that represent family members in space to visualize the relationships between them. This provides you with insight into how you relate to them. This relation between psyche and the environment you are in, is very interesting to Henke and comes back often by fusing architecture, psyche and body. 

The title of the show, Embrassade, does not just mean ‘embracing’ or ‘kissing’, but also has the connotation of ‘to cling to’: you stick with effort to a certain idea, maybe out of fear. But there’s also the sexual and emotional interpretation of an entanglement, where the fiberglass ropes serve as a kind of fetishistic metaphor. The word play of a title like Embrassade allows you to enjoy the secret revelation of this impermissible idea, while the prohibition of such a revelation remains intact. 

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