Jan Voss
Biography
1955-60 Studies at the Academy of Fine Arts Munich
1960 Moves to Paris
1966-67 Guest lecturer at the Academy of Fine Arts Hamburg
1968 Participation in documenta 4, Kassel
1979 First solo exhibition at the Galerie Georg Nothelfer
1987-92 Professor at the École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts, Paris
Lives and works in Berlin and Paris
The consistent topic of Jan Voss (*1936) painting is the ordered constellation, but at the same time constantly moving chaos of a multi-layered situation. In his unmistakable handwriting, his works show our lives as a complex, often chaotic passage of time. In our media-driven times, he reflects the unreasonable sum of signs we must absorb and process every day. Voss experiments with various techniques and materials; there are powerful, colour-intensive works on canvas as well as quiet, narrative and more drawing-like ones. In contrast, there are the paper reliefs, collaged from torn watercolours. Whether canvas, wood and paper relief or watercolour, what they all have in common is the accumulation of various elements of colour and form that interlock, overlap and are connected by lines, signs and fragments of signs. Voss initially applied this formal language to the two-dimensional picture, and later, since the 1980s, to the three-dimensional object. Consequently, everything that serves to "create the image" counts: crumpling, folding, tearing, sawing, nailing and gluing. Voss seeks constant change. Through new pictorial inventions and material explorations, he always manages to remain unique. This complexity, which characterizes Voss's works, "should," says Voss, "give the viewer associative freedom, only then does a picture unfold its poetic content. That is why the viewer must not be tied down to anything in particular. His thinking apparatus must be able to combine freely". Thus Jan Voss's works have an effect on the viewer that is on the one hand enigmatic and multi-layered, but also optimistic, cheerful and vital. "The works," says writer Peter Handke, who is friends with the artist, "give a house momentum, just as you give a swing momentum."
Exhibitions
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Collection Nothelfer. Selection of works by the artists of the gallery
8 January to 28 February 2025
Galerie
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ART COLOGNE
7 to 10 November 2024
Köln
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Jan Voss. Was Neues vom Tatort?
25 November 2023 to 10 February 2024
Galerie
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ART COLOGNE
16 to 19 November 2023
Köln
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More than 24 #2. Groupshow
10 November 2023 to 1 January 2024
Showroom
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More than 24
2 December 2022 to 28 January 2023
Showroom
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ART COLOGNE
16 to 20 November 2022
Köln
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cccc
15 September to 12 November 2022
Galerie & Showroom
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MÉLANGE DE 16
21 July to 3 September 2022
Showroom
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art KARLSRUHE
7 to 10 July 2022
Karlsruhe
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head-to-head-to-head
5 March to 1 May 2022
Galerie
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Kabinettausstellung
13 January to 12 February 2022
Galerie
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ART COLOGNE
17 to 21 November 2021
Köln
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Accrochage
18 December 2020 to 20 March 2021
Showroom
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Accrochage
7 November 2020 to 9 January 2021
Galerie
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Gruppenausstellung/Group Show
3 July to 29 August 2020
Galerie
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Gruppenausstellung/Group Show
29 June to 30 August 2019
Corneliusstraße
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Jan Voss. Von unterwegs
9 March to 13 April 2019
Corneliusstraße
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Accrochage
22 January to 23 February 2019
Corneliusstraße
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Sommeraccrochage
30 June to 15 September 2018
Corneliusstraße
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Guppenausstellung/Group exhibition
1 July to 26 August 2017
Corneliusstraße
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3D - Skulpturen und Objekte
17 September to 29 October 2016
Corneliusstraße
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Jan Voss. Dr Freud is not at home
28 March to 10 May 2014
Corneliusstraße
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Jan Voss - Wo geht´s denn lang
29 October to 17 December 2011
Corneliusstrasse
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Jan Voss - gestern heute morgen
19 September to 31 October 2009
Corneliusstrasse
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Jan Voss - Objekte, Collagen
25 November 2005 to end of January 2006
Uhlandstrasse
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Kazuo Shiraga - Fred Thieler - Jan Voss
September to October 2001
Deutsche Oper
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Jan Voss
February 2001
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Jan Voss
November 1997
Uhlandstrasse
Editions
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O.T./Untitled, 1995, Colour etching, signed and dated by the artist, 28,5 x 38 cm, Copies: 50
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O.T./Untitled, 1992, Colour etching, signed by the artist, 25 x 19 cm, Copies: 25
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O.T./Untitled, 1992, Colour etching, signed by the artist, 25 x 19 cm, Copies: 25
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Publications
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Lass den Drachen springen/ Let the dragon jump/ Fais sauter le dragon, 2016, Poems by Rainer G. Schmidt, german/english/french, 56 pages, 20 colour illustrations of watercolours by Jan Voss, Production: Katalogdruck-Berlin, EUR 12
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Monographie/Monograph, 2015, Text by Anne Tronche, French, 320 pages, 350 colour illustrations, ISBN 978 2 7541 0823 2, EUR 40
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Trajet de Jan Voss, 1985, Edited by Galerie Georg Nothelfer, Text by Bernard Noël, german and french Version, 184 pages, 212 ill., 167 colour ill., Hardcover in linen, Edition Galerie Georg Nothelfer, ISBN 3-87329-921-6, EUR 50
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