About Gabriele Schnitzenbaumer

The remarkable sculptures created by German artist Gabriele Schnitzenbaumer powerfully express an energetic gravity and intensity heightened by their archaic appearance. Adorned with tribal headdresses and medallions, these figures are the vessels of a sacred knowledge, seeking to transport the viewer to an elevated awareness. "These figures are totemic in aspect and the narratives are indirect and internal. The stories they contain are in fact archetypal ones and require an effort of self-recognition and serious introspection of the part of the viewer," writes Matthias Ostermann, art critic.

Schnitzenbaumer masterfully blends ceramic and metallic materials, thereby creating surfaces resembling decaying and oxidized metals or raw clay, adding to the archeological aura of each piece. "Schniztenbaumer does not have the inhibitions that many other ceramic artists suffer from. She adds wood and steel with great ease, coloring all the components to look like unfired clay or exposed metal. The reason is this: she is not making statements about ceramics or about clay as a material, as potters love to do, but about the poetic quality of ancient forms," comments Donald Locke, regular contributor to Creative Loafing.

Gabriele Schnitzenbaumer has exhibited throughout Germany, France, and the United States, including numerous shows with the Bill Lowe Gallery since 1992. She was an art professor at Ludwig-Maximillians University in Munich, Germany for 10 years.