03/05/2009

Cutting-Edge Cuckoo Clocks

Fusing Street Art With German Kitsch

Cuckoo clocks at the cutting edge of street art? Unlikely though it may sound, German artist Stefan Strumbel has given a provocative twist to a Black Forest tradition -- and it is going down a storm.

When Germany's iconic fashion designer, Karl Lagerfeld was photographed in front of a lurid cuckoo clock in German magazine Stern on the occasion of his 75th birthday, many readers were baffled. But for the young German artist Stefan Strumbel, it was the "ultimate accolade" to have his art selected by the influential pony-tailed doyen of German fashion.

On first seeing Strumbel's cuckoo clock, adorned with guns and antlers, at a fashion shoot Lagerfeld had reportedly exclaimed: "A new expression of German culture, how stimulating."

And Strumbel's work is nothing if not new. For five years the former graffiti artist has been constructing cuckoo clocks in his quiet hometown of Offenburg. In his studio, the traditional timepieces are given a brash makeover: Oversized clocks are daubed in garish colors and often decorated with hand grenades and bones, as well as more traditional symbols like deer antlers.

Some now hang in the Vicious Gallery in Hamburg, a leading showcase for German street art. Strumbel, 29, who won the world's first ever grant for street art, has exhibited in Berlin, Munich, New York and Miami. Right now his quirky designs are being snapped up, with orders coming in from across the world.

Like many street artists, his career kicked off with graffiti. And he says this background is vital to his work today: "The technique of emerging from the masses comes from spraying."

At the crux of Strumbel's work is one German word: Heimat. The quintessentially German concept, which roughly means homeland, was the title of a previous exhibition in Colorado, sparking confusion among visitors. "There is no English word for Heimat," Strumbel explains. "Some people link Heimat to a place, for others it is a feeling."

And it was his explorations into the concept of Heimat which led him to the cuckoo clock motif: "When I speak to people about Heimat, people from across Germany mention the cuckoo clock, it represents the German Heimat feeling."

His idiosyncratic take on Teutonic culture has drawn praise from some unusual quarters: "The German Cuckoo Clock Association also supports my work," he says with pride.

jas -- with reporting by Birger Menke

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