The Recklinghausen Kunstmeile (art mile) is a special part of the city’s numerous and widely renowned projects of public art. The Mückenhäuser as luminaires, created by Michael Sailstorfer in 2014 along a former colliery railway line, are much-loved in the city and have gained international recognition. I have often encountered people in different places around the world who told me how much they envied us our “lamps” on the Kunstmeile. Following the principle of light along the present-day walking and cycling path, which is exactly one mile long, the next step was to create more places to sit. It is a great pleasure for me that a second group of works will soon be installed on the Recklinghausen Kunstmeile, emerging from the competition documented here.

I would like to express my heartfelt thanks to the expert and judging panel for their work. The panel consisted of Mayor Christoph Tesche; Holger Freitag, Chair of the Committee for Culture; Dr Susanne Meyer-Büser, Curator at the Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen; Georg Elben, Director of the Skulpturenmuseum Marl; Dr Marianne Wagner, Curator at the LWL-Museum für Kunst und Kultur in Münster; and Dr Daniel Palmer, then Curator at Public Art Fund New York and now Director of the SCAD Museum of Art in Savannah.

My very special thanks, of course, go to the artists who, following the recommendation of the expert panel and the management of the Recklinghausen Museums, submitted the proposals brought together and documented here: Max Leiß, Maruša Sagadin, Toni Schmale and Daniil Shumikhin.

At the end of a day filled with discussions about public art in general and the exciting proposals in particular, the artist Max Leiß, who lives and works in Basel, was ultimately selected as the winner. As a former recipient of the junger westen art prize, Leiß is already well known in Recklinghausen for his poetic yet aesthetically clear works.

Submitted under the working title on the way, the forthcoming installation Wegstücke is compelling above all because it translates the competition brief in a remarkable way: both concretely and abstractly, both literally and through the sculptural-installative gesture that gives it form. Max Leiß’s Wegstücke is a section of the Kunstmeile's path reduced to a scale of 1:10, cast in concrete and stacked into a landscape of seating. The people of Recklinghausen and all visitors from near and far can now look forward to a new work of art in the urban landscape. During a walk or bike ride, they can take a break, linger on a new place to sit with a view of trees, grasses and part of the retention basin of the Emscher, and, in doing so, sit directly on the “sections of the path” of the Kunstmeile that have been stacked up for them.

(Nico Anklam, Director of the Museums of the City of Recklinghausen and Director of the Kunsthalle)

Max Leiß

Born in Bonn in 1982, Max Leiß is a visual artist who lives and works in Basel. His practice focuses on sculpture, photography and works for public space. Leiß trained as a wood sculptor and studied Fine Art at the AdBK Karlsruhe and the ENSBA Paris. His work has been exhibited internationally and has received numerous awards, including the junger westen art prize and the Kalinowski Prize in 2017. He has presented solo exhibitions at, among others, Kunsthaus Baselland, Kunsthalle Arbon, Kunsthaus Aarau, as well as at Nicolas Krupp, Basel, and Enrico Fornello, Milan. From 2016 to 2022, Max Leiß worked at the Institute for Landscape and Urban Studies at ETH Zurich. Since 2022, he has been a lecturer in Art and Design at the Institute of Architecture at Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts.

From Path to Form

The basis for the proposed work is the route within the perimeter, namely the section that marks the beginning of the Kunstmeile. The path is traced as movement, as a trajectory, and translated into the form of a line. This form is divided into several elements. These elements can then be freely arranged and developed into a spatial configuration that can be appropriated in a variety of ways as a place and seating area.
The Kunstmeile is an invitation to be on the move, to remain curious, to set off. Yet places of rest are needed, too. The artwork develops a line and a form from the movement that the Kunstmeile offers us. This form can then be occupied, individually or collectively. On the way – being on the move, but also quite literally: on the path. Sitting, lying down, looking. Not rigid, but following curved forms that, even as we sit, make us curious about the next bend in the path.

(Max Leiß)