JÖRG OBERGFELL | KOYA

Each year the President and Vice President select an artist to receive the Society of Scottish Artists Award and invitation to exhibit at the next Annual Exhibition. At the last exhibition Jörg Obergfell received this award for his work Yeti, for this exhibition, Jorg presents the installation, Koya.

The starting point for the 288 photographs by Jörg Obergfell were simple tool sheds in northern Japan. These small, improvised buildings are something fundamentally different from the concepts by architects as the ‘creators of form’.  They are an uncomfortable reminder that objects are older and more durable than ideas, and that sometimes it can be difficult to distinguish between the two.

In this predominately poor area, they serve mainly for the storage of farming material or are used recreationally. Between chaos and order, many of these constructions demonstrate an exuberance in execution that goes beyond the utilitarian. Through the creative handling of recycled materials, a need is met in an impressively artistic way.

Jörg Obergfell photographed a large number of these small-scale buildings, which he describes as “architecture without architects”, both in summer and in the typically snowy winters of this area. 

Jörg Obergfell was born in St.Georgen (Black Forest) and studied Fine Art at Goldsmiths College in London. His solo shows include Strange Folly, Gallery Em, Seoul (2017), Jörg Obergfell, Kunsthalle Mainz, Germany (2010), Second nature, Gallery Muro, Geneva, Switzerland (2010). Group shows include The Office École des Beaux-Arts, Montréal (2015), New German Art, German Embassy, London (2010). In 2007 he received an AHRC research scholarship and in 2013 the ACAC residency scholarship for a 3moths stay in Aomori Japan. His works utilise imitation and relation, absurd combinations and scale shifts. The results are model-like sculptures and photographs about mutual adaptations between nature, the individual and the built structures of big cities.