Karl Stengel
About
Karl Stengel has lived through important and dramatic periods in the history of 20th century art. Born in 1925 in Novi Sad, on the banks of the Danube, from his early childhood he had the impulse to “have to” draw and was strongly attracted by the contrast of black and white. After the war and the years in the Russian prison camp, a long time passed before a middle class student could be admitted to an art academy. It was the period of Socialist Realism, a style imposed by the Soviet Communist Party. There was no room for artistic individualism, or to seek one’s own possibilities, expressive style, or creativity. Upon the arrival of the Soviet tanks with the occupation of Hungary in 1956, Karl Stengel fled to Munich in Germany.
Karl then worked as an art teacher in Germany and on retirement lived and painted between his homes in Germany and Loro Ciuffenna near Arezzo. His works are divided into two major groups: the large canvases dominated by color, of strong emotional and lyrical abstract expressionist impact, that have their roots sunk in post-war American and European informel experimentation and in some pre-war Russian avant-garde art. The more surreal representations often of a smaller size on paper, have a more markedly European ancestry, in particular German Expressionism, and may for example, express a faceless male figure on stage. Music and literature were of great importance to Karl and references to them can often be seen in his works.
Karl Stengel passed away in his beloved Tuscan countryside, 25 June 2017.
Karl Stengel had exhibitions in the USA (NYC, Miami), Norway, Romania, Poland (Krakow, Warsaw), France (Paris, Cannes), Spain and Mexico. The first ever exhibition was in 1943, in the Russian camp in Siberia where Karl was a prisoner of war and showed his portraits. An officer saw Karl drawing with a piece of charcoal on a cement bag and provided him paper and pencil to portray him and his colleagues. In Germany, he had many shows in Berlin and in Munich, where the Institute of Italian Culture presented his illustrations of Boccaccio’s Decameron and Giuseppe Ungaretti’s Frammenti. In 2015, Stengel showed at Palazzo Mora in the context of the Biennale di Venezia. In that same year, he won the first prize at international contest of GemlucArt in Monte-Carlo. In 2016, he had a solo show at Palazzo Loredan in Venice, where the Istituto Veneto di Scienze, Lettere et Arti is based, as well as another solo show at the Galerie Ribolzi in Monte-Carlo, where the opening was attended by HRH Princess Caroline of Hanover.
EXHIBITIONS
2024 Di Segno in diSegno Accademia delle Arti e del Disegno di Firenze
2023 SCOPE ART FAIR Miami, USA
2023 Affordable Art Fair NYC fall edition – Camilla Stengel works created in collaboration with Karl Stengel
2023 ALMA sculpture park – Almacelles, Spain
2023 P FINE ART Gallery, Atlanta USA
2022 SCOPE ART FAIR Miami, USA
2022 Solo exhibition, De la figuración a la abstracción del Maestro Karl Stengel – Museo Bolivariano de Arte Contemporáneo – Santa Marta, Colombia
2022 Solo exhibition – Tra figurazione e astrazione – Pinacoteca Comunale di Gaeta, Italy
2022 Art Busan – South Korea
2022 Solo exhibition IGONG Gallery – Daejeon South Korea
2022 Solo exhibition Galeria de la Academia Interamericana de Derechos Umanos, Saltillo, Coahuila, Mexico
2021 Positions Berlin
2021 Art Market Budapest
2021 Art Fair Vilnius
2021 Discovery Art Fair, Frankfurt
2021 Begemot Art & Fashion Gallery, Barcelona, Spain
2021 Solo exhibition Casa de la Cultura Gómez Palacio, Durango, Messico
2020-2021 Solo exhibition Accademia d’Ungheria, Rome, Italy
2020 WopArt Fair online, Lugano
2020 Solo exhibition Museo Guillermo Ceniceros – Durango, Mexico
2020 Art Fair ArtVilnius
2020 Positions Berlin
2019 OpenArtCode Tokyo, Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum – Tokyo, Japan
2019 KIAF 2019, Seoul, South Korea
2019 Top of Art Basel, in the context of Art Basel – Basel, Switzerland
2019 OpenArtCode Geneva, Studio Art Unlimited – Geneva, Switzerland
2019 Punti di Vista – Hermann Nitsch / Karl Stengel Galleria Zetaeffe – Florence, Italy
2019 Americans in Florence, Collezione Stengel, Palazzo Rosselli del Turco – Florence, Italy
2018 Solo exhibition, Museo Bolivariano de Arte Contemporáneo – Santa Marta, Colombia
2018 Solo exhibition, Museo Sant’Agostino – Genoa, Italy
2018 Solo exhibition. Disegni, Galleria Zetaeffe – Florence, Italy
2018 OpenArtCode Florence, Basilica di San Lorenzo – Florence, Italy
2017 OpenArtCode Cannes, Gare Maritime de Cannes – Cannes, France
2017 Solo exhibition, Collezione Stengel, Palazzo Rosselli del Turco – Florence, Italy
2017 ArtTime – Udine, Italy
2016 OpenArtCode Tokyo, Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum – Tokyo, Japan
2016 500 l’estetica dell’arte in un unico prezzo – Galleria Immaginaria – Florence, Italy
2016 Solo exhibition Palazzo Loredan, Venice, Istituto Veneto di Scienze, Lettere ed Arti
2016 GemlucArt Monaco, Auditorium Rainier III – Principality of Monaco
2016 Solo exhibition Galerie Ribolzi – Principality of Monaco
2015 GemlucArt Monaco – Principality of Monaco
2015 Personal Structures in the context of the Venice Biennale, Palazzo Mora – Venice, Italy
2015 Palazzo Medici Riccardi – Florence, Italy
2014 Art Fusion Galleries – Miami, USA
2014 Immaginaria Arti Visive – Basel, Switzerland
2014 Galerie C.C. Paul – Karlsruhe, Germany
2013 Galleria Pentart – Rome, Italy
2013 Galleria Immaginaria, Art International – Zurich, Switzerland
2012 Curtea de Argeș – Romania
2012 OpenArtCode Paris – Paris, France
2012 WAV Party – Madrid, Spain
2012 OpenArtCode Gallery, Galerie Mona Lisa – Paris, France
2011 Karl Stengel at the San Lorenzo church – Florence, Italy
2011 WorldArtVision Barcelona – Barcelona, Spain
2010 Solo exhibition Studio Abba Florence, Italy
2009 Galleria 9 Colonne – Bologna, Italy
2009 Omaggio a Tristano – Galleria D’ARS – Milan, Italy
2009 Galeria Artemis – Cracow, Poland
2009 Broadway Gallery – New York, USA
2008 WorldArtVision Cancun – Cancun, Mexico
2008 Art Action, Comune di Novara – Novara, Italy
2008 Galeria Zapiecek – Warsaw, Polonia
2007 Auditorio Comunale – Montevarchi, Italy
2006 Art Forum – Berlin, Germany
2006 Galleri SG – Trondheim, Norway
2005 Galleria Gio-Art – Lucca, Italy
2004 Laboratorio delle Arti – Piacenza, Italy
2003 Galleria Gnaccarini – Bologna, Italy
2003 La Filanda – Loro Ciuffenna, Italy
2003 Galerie Hagenring – Hagen, Germany
2003 Artisti in Fiera – Parma, Italy
2002 ideArte Gruppo del vento – Cascina, Pisa, Italy
2001 Galleria Comunale San Ludovico – Parma, Italy
1999 Staatsoper Temesvar – Romania
1997 Altre Luci – San Giustino Valdarno, Italy
1997 Gallery Howell – Jonesboro, USA
1995 ‘Il Finto e il non Finto’ Lido Morini/Karl Stengel, Auditorium Comunale Montevarchi – Italy
1992 Galerie Vigny – München, Germany
1984 Italienisches Kulturinstitut – München, Germany
1985 Giovanni Battista – Florence, Italy
1983 Skulpturen Straße – München, Germany
1983 Galerie C.C.Paul – München, Germany
1982 Galerie Sommerhausen, Sommerhausen
1981 Galerie C.C.Paul – München, Germany
1980 Galerie C.C. Paul – München, Germany
1979 Galerie Marsyas – München, Germany
1978 Galerie ‘N’ – München, Germany
1976 Galerie Bessler – Stuttgart, Germany
1976 Haus Hufenbach – Donauwörth, Germany
1974 Senatsgalerie – Berlin, Germany
1972 Hollerhaus – Irschenhausen, Germany
1970 Elche, Alicante, Spain
Online exhibitions
Icon label
Icon label