Skulpturenpark Köln

Menschliche Kälte (Human Coldness) is the title given by Bernd Kastner (b. 1957 in Düsseldorf, Germany) to his graceful female nude, kneeling in the fork of a tree. She is sculpted from the artist's preferred material, terracotta, whose amorphous mass he infuses with life with surgical precision. The choice of material is no coincidence. For terracotta provides the ideal material with which to undertake the numerous attempts to mould the emotionally-charged states of the creative process into a specific form. Entrusted to trained dextrous fingers and with a precise application of coloured glazes, its coarse, unadorned asceticism is transformed into scenarios and images, possessed of a magical wizardry and lightness. Determined ultimately in the firing process itself, the various nuances and tonalities reinforce the already animated character of his work. Thus Menschliche Kälte appears remote and detached, yet at the same time, is informed with the entire spectrum of human emotions.