Falling Ice Skater

Asta Gröting studied sculpture at the Düsseldorf Art Academy between 1981 and 1986, and started to produce works of sculpture and film in the 1990s. Interested in the ideas and works of Joseph Beuys, and especially in the ways he discusses the social nature of the body, Gröting also established a dialogue with this inquiry in her sculptures. Her practice examines the idea of the social body, considering it to be the medium through which the bodily experiences oscillating between the visible and the invisible, the audible and the inaudible, and the tactual and the affective become possible. Gröting is often interested in the limits of sense experiences. As part of the same line of inquiry, notions of borders and shelter, inside and outside, and ways of existing in-between are commonly encountered in her works.

The ironic way of Gröting’s drawings to elaborate on ordinary moments of daily life opens up the opportunity to reflect on existential problems from a humorous perspective. In "Falling Ice Skater", the smoothly flowing lines make up bumps over which a figure is playfully skating, providing a powerful example as to the scenes one may encounter in Gröting’s works.