Michael Cleff

(* 1961 Bochum)
1990 – 1996 Sculpture studies, Düsseldorf Art Academy, master student with Prof. Fritz Schwegler
Lives and works in Bochum and Mülheim an der Ruhr

Ausstellungen (Auswahl)

2019 "Michael Cleff – Mischung", Kunstforum Solothurn, Solothurn, Switzerland
2018 "An den Rändern", Gesellschaft der Freunde junger Kunst, Baden-Baden, Germany
2017 "Liquids", Centre céramique contemporaine, La Borne, France
2017 "An den Rändern", Kunstmuseum Ahlen, Ahlen, Germany
2014 "Shifting", Carlernst Kürten Stiftung, Unna, Germany
2014 "Über fast rechte Winkel", Landesmuseum Oldenburg, Oldenburg, Germany
2012 "Sculptures Céramiques", Galerie Hélène Porée, Paris, France
2007 Galerie Pierre, Paris, France
2005 "Art Karlsruhe", One Artist Show, Karlsruhe, Germany
2004 "Michael Cleff – Sculptures", Galerie Puls, Brüssel, Belgium
2003 "Garth Clark Gallery", Long Island City, NY, USA
2002 Galerie b15, München, Germany
2002 Lauenburgischer Kunstverein, Büchen, Germany
2001 Galerie Kossdorf, Wien, Austria
1998 Garth Clark Gallery, New York, USA

Arbeiten in Museen (Auswahl)

American Craft Museum, New York, USA
Long Beach Museum, Long Beach / California, USA
Mint Museum of Art and Design, Charlotte / North Carolina, USA
Newark Museum, New Jersey, USA
Racine Art Museum, Racine / Wisconsin, USA
The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston / Texas, USA
Charles A. Wustum Museum of Fine Arts, Racine / Wisconsin, USA
Museum of Modern Ceramic Art, Mino, Japan
World Ceramic Center, Icheon City, South Korea
Musée Nationale de Céramique, Sèvres, France
Musée Magnelli, Vallauris, France
Museo Internazionale delle Ceramiche, Faenza, Italy
Musée Ariana, Genf, Switzerland
Badisches Landesmuseum, Karlsruhe, Germany
Grassimuseum, Leipzig, Germany
Museum Angewandte Kunst, Frankfurt, Germany
Keramikmuseum Berlin, Berlin, Germany
Keramikmuseum Westerwald, Höhr-Grenzhausen, Germany
Keramion - Museum für Zeitgenössische Keramik, Frechen, Germany
Kunstmuseum, Ahlen/Westfalen, Germany
Kunstgewerbemuseum Schloß Pillnitz, Dresden, Germany
Kunstsammlungen Veste Coburg, Coburg, Germany
Kunsthalle Mannheim, Mannheim, Germany
Städtische Museen Stadt Landshut, Landshut, Germany
Württembergisches Landesmuseum, Stuttgart, Germany

For many years, Michael Cleff's sculptures have impressed us with their concentrated power, which they derive from their simplicity, from their unity and from the stringency with which Cleff pursues his conception and keeps pushing it forward, studying it, drawing new conclusions from it and gaining further insights.

A few formal components are carefully varied and brought into ever new relationships. Cleff's minimalist concept is based on recurring basic geometric shapes - circle, square, rectangle, ellipse - and a reduced, monochrome colour scheme. It is as if he had decided on certain tones or a certain number of syllables, from whose different combinations he now always adds new tone sequences or builds lines of verse. Especially when one can look at several of Cleff's works at the same time, this has a meditative equanimity; the calm equanimity of one who seeks to comprehend phenomena through the ever new declination of what is observed.
Gabi Dewald, journalist