Peter Roehr (1 September 1944 in Lauenburg in Pommern – 15 August 1968 in Frankfurt am Main) was a German Pop Art minimalist artist.Tate
Life Roehr was the only child of Kurt and Eleonora Röhr. After their divorce the mother moved with her child first to Leipzig and then to Frankfurt am Main. After visiting the Volksschule he completed an apprenticeship as producer for electronic signage in Frankfurt am Main.Peter Roehr, 1944–1968, exhibition catalogue, Städtisches Museum Leverkusen, Morsbroich Museum, 1972, p. 72 Afterward he studied from 1962 to 1966 at the Werkkunstschule (today RheinMain University of Applied Sciences) in Wiesbaden. He studied in the class of Vincent Weber and graduated in 1966. His early works were made in 1962 and 1963. In 1964 Roehr met Paul Maenz, who later became an important art dealer. Roehr was in close contact with the artists Charlotte Posenenske and Thomas Bayrle, who lived in Frankfurt as well.
In May 1967 Roehr and Paul Maenz organized in the Studio Galerie of the Goethe University Frankfurt a groundbreaking exhibition entitled Serielle Formationen where works by Carl Andre, Jan Dibbets, Hans Haacke, Donald Judd, Piero Manzoni and Jan Schoonhoven were shown.
Peter Roehr died in 1968 at the age of 23 from cancer.Jeffrey Kastner on Petr Roehr - Artfourm InternationalTHE REVOLUTION WILL NOT DIEOF LEAD POSOINING - SCHIRN MAGPeter Roehr: Film Montages (City Gallery Wellington 16 March — 27 June 27
Work During a period of five years Roehr produced more than 600 works. They can be categorized in ten groups. Each group is defined by the material the regarded work is made of. Roehrs Oeuvre can be labelled as conceptual art because he aligned each work to the conception of the unvaried repetition.Peter Roehr, Frieze Magazine, Issue 60, June–August 2001
Montages His most famous work, Film-Montages I-III (1965),Filmmontagen I + II + III, Peter Roehr 1965-66 - Daimer Art CollectionPeter Roehr : Film-Montagen I-III (1965) (DVD video, 2009) - WorldCat.orgInternational Pop Cinema|Dallas Museum of Art was edited on 16mm film (and would later be digitized)Oneohtrix Point Never: Visual Cues and Eccojams|Hammer MuseumThe World Goes Pop - Google Books (pg.259) from fragments of TV commercialsInstitute of Modern Art to create an aesthetic film and illustrating his concept of a time structure related to principles of serial music.Pioneers in film: the art-house films that shaped popular culture|The IndependentFilmmontagen I-III (1965)|MUBI He would do the same thing with radio adverts on his 1966 piece Tonmontagen (Sound Montages).Radio as Art - Google Books (pg.296)
Legacy Video artist William E. Jones paid tribute with his 2006 piece Film Montages (for Peter Roehr) featuring fragments from pre-AIDS gay porn films.Film Montages (for Peter Roehr), 2006 - William E. Jones - The Modern InstituteExtracted: Recent Films by William E. Jones|Walker Art CenterThe Music and Sound of Experimental Film - Google Books (pg.251)
Quotations "I alter material by organizing it unchanged. Each work is an organized area of identical elements. Neither successive nor additive, there is no result or sum." (1964)
"I assemble available things of the same kind together. These might, for example, be: objects, photographs, freestanding forms such as letters, texts, tones and sounds, film-material, etc. The results I call montages" (1965)Peter Roehr, exhibition catalogue, Kunsthalle Tübingen, 1972, book cover
Exhibitions (selection) 1965: Adam Seide, Frankfurt am Main, Abendausstellung II (auch 1967) 1967: Galerie Dorothea Loehr, Frankfurt am Main 1971: Morsbroich Museum, Leverkusen 1971: Galerie Paul Maenz, Cologne (also in 1972, 1973, 1974, 1976, 1981, 1985, 1988) 1972: Galleria Sperone, Turin; documenta 5, Kassel 1977: Kunsthalle Tübingen; documenta 6, Kassel 1977: Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven; Frankfurter Kunstverein, Frankfurt am Main; Kunsthalle Tübingen 1978: Museum of Modern Art, Oxford 2000: Neues Museum Weimar, Weimar 2004: Museum für Moderne Kunst, Frankfurt am Main 2009: Städel Museum and Museum für Moderne Kunst, Frankfurt am Main: Peter Roehr. Werke aus Frankfurter SammlungenFünf Jahre und kein bisschen mehr, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 08/1968, February 19, 1968, p. 76 2010: Haus Konstruktiv, Zürich: Visionäre Sammlung Vol.12: Peter Roehr 2012: Kunsthaus Wiesbaden: dasselbe anders / immer dasselbe: Charlotte Posenenske und Peter Roehr
See also Andy Warhol Vaporwave - similar in content Criticism of capitalism Minimalist film Roy Lichtenstein
References
External links Light Industry: We Dig Repetition - Peter Roehr on Experimental Cinema The Cold and Crystalline Poetry of Minimal Pop Artist Peter Roehr Teaser trailer for German Pop Exhibition (with material from Peter Roehr) on Vimeo