Pictures and objects by Achim Freyer

Achim Freyer, significant director, stage designer, filmmaker and visual artist exhibits at the Museum for Sepulchral Culture. The subject of death has long played an important role in Freyer's art. With the exhibition “Individuals” a suite of paintings and ceramics has been created, which is entirely dedicated to this theme. They convey two things: "Freyer puts a World Theater on stage in a pictorial and ceramic way, whose figurations resemble props that seem to stem from the fire of the Fenice in Venice, an amalgam from Commedia dell'Arte, infernal creatures, masks of torture, silhouettes of figures from his own theater productions, and, as Dante calls it in Inferno, rabble created for disaster. Masks of course also here." (translated from: Exhibition catalog. Achim Freyer, Individuen, ARTCO Gallery Leipzig 1998)

Achim Freyer, born in 1934, was a master student of Bertolt Brecht, then an employee of Ruth Berghaus, Adolf Dresen and Benno Besson. His artistic career was promoted by Fritz Cremer; it was also closely associated with AR Penck, Hermann Glöcker, Carlfriedrich Claus and Gerhard Altenbourg. After his first solo exhibition, Freyer left the former GDR in 1972. Numerous presentations, including those at the documenta in Kassel (1977 and 1987), made him famous in the following years.

Alongside this, his international career as a director and stage designer for opera and drama was developing. A special focus was always put on modern music (Alban Berg, Paul Hindemith, Mauricio Kagel, John Cage and others). Thus, he recently directed "Majakowski's Death - Totentanz" by Schnebel at the Leipzig Opera. In 1998, Freyer received the Prize of the World Theater Organization. He is the founder and artistic director of the Freyer Ensemble, which has developed a theater of its own unique character from music, dance, language and artistry.