Anke Eilergerhard

Anke Eilergerhard, from Wuppertal, Germany, is a captivating artist renowned for her mesmerizing sculptures that engage not only our sight but also our senses of touch, taste, and smell. Trained as a painter, Anke ventured into the realm of silicone sculpture in 2004, where her fascination with the tactile qualities of materials took center stage. Even in her early paintings, she explored floral elements that extended beyond the confines of the canvas, incorporating textured frames.

The artist employs silicone and a piping bag, a tool commonly used for pastry decoration, as her chosen medium. Drawing inspiration from pastry techniques, her works embrace the traditions of Pop Art, blurring the boundaries between formal beauty and everyday objects. The precision and repetitive motifs within her art reflect her deep fascination with sensory pleasures. The meticulous layering of silicone creates "whirlpools of whipped cream," lending her sculptures a structured and controlled appearance.  With their textured surfaces, Anke's sculptures entice our senses, making it nearly impossible to resist the urge to touch them.  Despite their static nature, her series "Crown" exudes a subtle sense of movement, evoking unfurling or embedding within the depths of the structure, accompanied by a discreetly sensual undertone.

Anke Eilergerhard's works both aesthetically and thematically engage in feminist discourse. By appropriating the meticulous technique of cake decoration while rejecting the kitchen environment traditionally associated with femininity, she skillfully challenges preconceived notions. Mastering this technique with precision, often dismissed as a recreational pastime, serves as a testament to her dedication. Her sculptures provoke contemplation on the multifaceted nature of beauty, encompassing desire, love, luxury, lust, excess, decadence, and more. They expose the transient and ephemeral aspects of beauty while capturing the ambivalent dynamics of elegance, freezing moments of disequilibrium and movement. Anke infuses her sculptures with hints of gender-specific design, personifying them with playful and sensual characteristics, evoking the voluptuous curves of a woman's body. She describes the detail of whipped cream as the epitome of perfection and a heavenly experience. Her sculptures have gained global recognition, exhibited and collected worldwide. Notably, she recently received the art silicone Tempelhof-Schönberger-Berlin Art Prize and collaborated with the international fashion house FENDI on a project titled "Sweet Dream" in 2017.