Friedrich Kunath

Written by James Frey and Friedrich Kunath and James Elkins and Ariana Reines
The first major monograph devoted to the witty paintings and sculpture of Los Angeles–based artist Friedrich Kunath.

From his precipitous rise in the late 1990s and early 2000s, Friedrich Kunath has been making art that beautifully and lyrically combines the experience of the ordinary with the sublime. In the first major monograph devoted to the past fifteen years of his work, the reader sees how the artist poignantly yet playfully distills the fundamentals of human emotion—desire, loneliness, and anxiety—creating comically tragic scenes in which human beings try to find their way in the world. Shifting easily between genres and modes of making—from painting to installation and even video—the work always maintains his signature wit and humor, laced with melancholy.

The artist has considered the ideas that run throughout his oeuvre and offers new insights by gathering works across media that are connected conceptually in eight chapters, organized thematically rather than chronologically. Art historian James Elkins takes a historical approach to Kunath’s work, linking him to both recent and older traditions of European painting. Ariana Reines contributes a poem inspired by the artist’s work and James Frey writes a short essay inspired by Kunath’s persona. The artist and John McEnroe, the famed tennis player, have a spirited conversation about their shared passion for the game of tennis.

Text by Paul Hobson, Michael Bracewell, Ory Dessau, Claire Le Restif, Paul Luckraft

In My Room is a major new publication surveying the work of artist Friedrich Kunath. It encompasses the last five years of Kunath’s practice and is an extension of his unique aesthetic.

Complex and playful installations of paintings, sculptures and videos feature a cornucopia of imagery, brought together from such diverse sources as Old Master paintings, slapstick cartoons, anthropomorphized animals, and pop iconography from the 1960s and 70s.

A narrative around the emotional life of the artist is enacted through fictional characters, producing an in-between world filled with both humour and pathos. The catalogue is designed by Yvonne Quirmbach in close collaboration with the artist. New essays come from Michael Bracewell, Ory Dessau, Claire Le Restif, and Paul Luckraft.

Published on the occasion of the exhibition Friedrich Kunath: Raymond Moody’s Blues at Modern Art Oxford, 21 September – 17 November 2013.

Text by David Berman; photographs by Michael Schmelling
This is Friedrich Kunath’s first artist book published in the United States. In making the book, Kunath collaborated with the musician and poet David Berman and photographer Michael Schmelling.

You Owe Me a Feeling was produced alongside Kunath’s solo exhibition at Blum & Poe, Los Angeles: 2012′s Lacan’s Haircut.

Published on the occasion of the exhibition Things We Did When We Were Dead at BQ, Berlin, April 28 – June 30, 2012.

Published on the occassion of the artist’s first solo exhibition in the UK, at White Cube Hoxton Square, April 15 – June 3, 2011.

Artist book, published on the occassion of the exhibition I used to be darker, but then I got lighter and then I got dark again, at Kaikai Kiki Gallery, Tokyo, May 13 – June 12, 2010.

Text by Douglas Fogle, Matthew Thompson, René Zechlin

In his drawings, texts, objects, photographs, and videos, Friedrich Kunath deals with such themes as longing, melancholy, loneliness, wanderlust, and wistfulness from a subjective viewpoint that finds expression in titles like Homesick, I am a stranger here or I may not always love you. He combines personal life experiences with literary, musical, or art historical references into visual, ironic commentaries in various media. The installative total context of his exhibitions forms narrative contexts between the individual pieces that lead to the viewer to a fantastic world of associations. 



This catalogue is published on the occasion of Kunath’s solo exhibition at the Kunstverein Hannover, November 28, 2009–January 24, 2010.

Artist book: set of 32 color postcards in box. Published on the occasion of the exhibition Hello walls at BQ, Berlin, Sept. 4 – Oct. 31, 2009.

Extracts from “In someone’s shadow” by Rod McKuen on verso of postcards.

by Heidi Zuckerman Jacobson, Gregor Jansen, Anna Grande, and Jeff Poe

This is the artist’s first monograph, published concurrently with his first solo museum exhibition in the U.S. at the Aspen Art Museum.

Artist book, published on the occassion of the exhibition Warum, at BQ, Cologne, January 19 – March 10, 2007.

Artist book, published on the occasion of the exhibition Our Endless Numbered Days at BQ, Cologne, 2004

Artist book, published on the occasion of the exhibition of the Dirk Bell / Friedrich E. Kunath exhibiton Why are my friends such finks, at BQ, Cologne October 31, 1998 – January 30, 1999.