b. 1955 in Helmstedt
lives and works in Düsseldorf and Bonn

Werner Haypeter works primarily with industrial paints and lacquers, epoxy resin and MDF, synthetics, aluminum, and Plexiglas. These materials do not necessarily speak a language of cheery lyricism. And yet they form the basis for Werner Haypeter’s sensitive and poetic works. The crucial thing for him is the way these materials remain themselves and yet point beyond themselves in his wall objects, installations, and sculptures.

The artist operates according to the rules of Concrete art, just as he takes his lead, both in his selection of materials and in the artistic result, from the concepts of minimalist art and Arte Povera. From minimalism he takes the prosaic materials and the precision of the production process. His choice of materials and the urbane effect of their arrangement recall Arte Povera.

One leitmotif in Werner Haypeter’s oeuvre is a play with surface, layering, and transparency. It is found in nearly all his works, beginning with the large installations such as Lichtfeld (Light Field), which Werner Haypeter created for the Alf Lechner Museum Ingolstadt in 2004, and extending even to his small-format folded paper works. The specific translucence of plastics and papers serves Haypeter as a filter for the colors and materials beneath them, which come to light only indirectly and in a veiled way. They form an aesthetic membrane and a mediator between the work, its surroundings, and the viewer.