Gereon Krebber
Covid/B1-Remix
Bottrop vaccination center
Bottrop, Germany

An ongoing exhibition at the Bottrop vaccination until at least June.

For Krebber, the opportunity to reach out to a different kind of audience was also part of the appeal. Part of his work revolves around subverting the conventions surrounding the fine art world. The strangeness of a cavernous, unevenly lit space with a large tarp over the golf course’s Astroturf green only added a layer of intrigue to his sculpture collection. Krebber’s father was a veterinarian, and much of his work displays a lifelong fixation with bodies and bodily functions, meaning there was an appropriate semantic link to a vaccination center as well.

While Krebber says a few people remain glued to their smartphones during their appointments, the large-scale works are hard to ignore. Among the nonflammable sculptures that he ultimately selected are a 15-foot-long polystyrene humanoid “doll” and a hanging mobile with fragments of sanded-down mirrors. He says he is looking forward to his own vaccination appointment and hopes that the exhibition gives patients a positive experience with theirs. “We don’t need art like we need food, but it is part of our world and part of our lives,” Krebber says. “And I don’t want to have that taken away from me for longer than it has been.”

text by Diana Hubbel for Architectural Digest, March 3, 2020.