KölnSkulptur 5 – Reality Check ist the fifth exhibition of outdoor sculpture at the Skulpturenpark Köln. KölnSkulptur 5 has been curated by Managing and Artistic Director Dr. Renate Goldmann and presents 17 new works to the public. Among the works is Dirk Skreber’s Reaktor, a hole with a car inside that seemingly collided with a steel bar. Dirk Skreber was born in Lübeck, Germany, in 1961. He studied at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf under the teacher Alfonso Hüppi. Skreber lives and works in New York. He works in sculpture, installation and painting. Car crashes and natural disasters are often the subject matter of his work. “Still resonating with the acceleration of the car and the impact of the collision, the deformed construct evokes an image of gruesome beauty. In 1909, the first Futurist Manifesto celebrated “The Beauty of Speed”. Exactly one hundred years later Dirk Skreber (* 1961) exhibits a car wreck, which as a metaphor of destruction can be read as a demonstration of the resurgence of energy through speed and of the cathartic impact of destruction itself. Indeed, it could serve as an early 21st century response to the stated aims of the Futurists. Yet the work also elicits a positive response from the visitor: Below in the hole, the human body is exposed to the full energy field of the Reaktor (in which the production energy, the velocity energy and the deformation energy are stored). In keeping with the artist’s intention, viewers find themselves returning to daily reality in a reinvigorated, energetically-charged state.” (Excerpt from the press release). Dirk Skreber: Reaktor / KölnSkulptur 5 / Skulpturenpark Köln. Cologne / Germany, August 15, 2009