Kai Kein Respekt (Kai no Respect)

The book titled "Kai Kein Respect" accompanies the first major survey exhibition of Kai Althoff, one of the most compelling and original voices in Contemporary Art. Organized by the Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, the exhibition documents the most important aspects of the artist's work over the past fifteen years. Co-published by Bridge House Publishing and the ICA, Boston, the book offers full-color illustrations of Althoff's drawings, watercolors, collages, paintings, photographs, performances and installations presinting a comprehensive overview of his complex and varied oeuvre.

Nicholas Baume, Chief Curator, ICA Boston, states "Kai Althoff's work deals explicitly with powerful feelings. The works often evoke or invent narratives, where characters inhabit imaginary worlds that provide allegories of real human experience and emotion." Althoff draws on a multitude of sources in his art, from Germanic folk traditions to recent popular culture and from medieval and gothic religious imagery to early modern expressionism.

Kai Althoff, who also founded the band "Workshop", was born in 1966 in Cologne, Germany, where he currently lives and works. He has had solo exhibitions at galleries in Berlin, Cologne, London, New York, Vienna and Hamburg. Althoff has also been featured in numerous international group exhibitions including the 1993 and 2003 Venice Biennales, "Chere Paintre, Leibe Maler, Dear Painter" at the Centre Pompidou in Paris (2002), and "Drawing Now-8 Propositions" at the Museum of Modern Art, New York (2002)