Philip Wiegard (b. 1977, Schwetzingen, Germany) lives and works in Berlin, Germany. He has been working with diverse media such as photography and sculpture, often utilizing shifts in perspective to create and expose the illusion of depth. With a focus on the surface, his work manages to question the obvious and reveal underlying structures.

Wiegard studied Fine Arts in Berlin and New York (Hunter College) and graduated in 2003 from the University of Fine Arts, Berlin (UdK) with the Graduates Special Award. He received grants from the German People’s Trust (Studienstiftung des Deutschen Volkes), as well as from the Berlin Senate for a Residency at Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris in 2007. He has collaborated with many artists and art collectives, such as Assume vivd astro focus, or basso Berlin, as well as with fashion design labels Meadhamkirchhoff and Bernhard Willhelm.

His recent exhibitions include Funeral Charade of Poses, Hebbel Theater (HAU1), Berlin, Germany; Turtle Salon, Galerie Arnaud Lefebvre, Paris, France; Rooms without Walls, Hayward Gallery, London, UK; Mind the Gap, Kunsthaus Glarus, Glarus, Switzerland; Sammlung/Collection, Migrosmuseum für Gegenwartskunst, Zürich, Switzerland

Spring Workshop is delighted to host artist Christodoulos Panayiotou and his collaborator, Philip Wiegard for a two-month residency program from March 25 to May 17, 2014. During his residency, Panayiotou will embark on a project in the China’s Guangdong province, researching what has become home to the world’s largest concentration of artificial flower factories. Working beyond the realm of documentary photography to tell a story, Panayiotou is drawn by the need to visit these places to inform his work.

Wallpaper Workshop with children (April 12-23)
A workshop for children aged 10-15 years, led by fellow-artist and occasional Panayiotou-collaborator Philip Wiegard, is designed to create handmade wallpaper in a series of patterns developed by the artist from a historic artisanal technique that requires the small fingers of children. The production of handmade wallpaper refers to the history and economy of pre-industrial labor, and a time when children were used to produce goods such as silk flowers because of their delicate hands. Wiegard will introduce the wallpaper materials and technique to participants and choreograph a specific workflow that aims at the rationalized production of large quantities of wallpaper.

Exhibition (May 3 – July 13)
The research and workshop programmes culminate in an exhibition hosted at Spring, and will feature Panayiotou’s new works against the confrontational backdrop of Wiegard’s wallpaper. Topics such as artisanship and mass production, pre-industrial and globalized production, representation, economy and the history of child labor, all of which are central to the exhibition, will also be explored through talks and discussions held at Spring.

Christodoulos Panayiotou and Philip Wiegard are at Spring at the invitation of Mimi Brown, Spring’s Director and Defne Ayas, Spring’s Curator-at-Large. Parts of the resulting work will have a European premiere at the 8th Berlin Biennale for Contemporary Art from May 29 to August 3, 2014. Please click here for program details.

Artist’s website