JOHN BOCK ∙ NIXNUTZ CLIMAX
Haus Mödrath is delighted to present a major solo exhibition by John Bock, following his contribution to our group show Immer feste druff two years ago. The exhibition will remain on view through summer 2026.
John Bock is a sculptor, filmmaker, performance lecturer, and draftsman. He is best known for his large-scale installations—the artist refers to these as Summenmutationen, a term he coined from the German words for “sum” and “mutation”—along with his genre-defying lectures and his idiosyncratic, theatrical universe of language. In these materially dense Summenmutationen, Bock makes extensive use of everyday household items such as articles of clothing, hygiene products (cotton swabs), foodstuffs (shaving cream), and electrical appliances (turntables), as well as agricultural tools and equipment evoking his own rural roots. With relish and a generous dose of dark humor, the artist stages a “manic world theatre ” that probes the shadow side of human existence and lays bare the breaking of social taboos in radical, unsettling ways. His work sketches the precise counter-image to our efficiency-driven, sanitized, conformity-enforcing present—challenging the cult of the body, the primacy of uniform codes of language and behavior, and the optimization and disciplining of mind and body with radical unruliness and transgressive physicality.
Haus Mödrath will present Bock’s first survey of works from the past fifteen years. The exhibition highlights the growing importance of his films, which initially documented the live lecture-performances staged within the Summenmutationen but have since evolved into autonomous works with their own cinematic references and qualities. These films now function as a kind of emulsion, merging the filmic universe with the Summenmutationen and their artifacts, many of which originated as props for the films. The exhibition includes key pieces from the period—several of which are being shown in Germany for the first time—alongside a selection of new works from 2025.
John Bock was born in 1965 in Gribbohm, Schleswig-Holstein, and lives and works in Berlin. Since 2004, he has served as Professor of Sculpture at the Staatliche Akademie der Bildenden Künste in Karlsruhe.