Hundred and more
CLARITY – SIMPLICITY – VARIETY
We were so excited about Hans Karl Zeisel’s project from the beginning that we didn’t think twice about asking him to cooperate with us.
During the preliminary talks, it quickly became clear that our projects had a lot in common. A look at the resulting photographs probably suffices to understand our excitement. The clear shapes and colours seem made for each other.
ENDLESS POSSIBILITIES
Engaging in the near endless configuration and shaping possibilities of this art-design-game-book is definitely worth it. Contrary to other tile-based-games and puzzles, Hundred and more doesn’t set any limits to fantasy, be it through rules, shape-parameters or other constraints.
The room for free configuration is wide open.
After a few moments, you become overwhelmed by everything that can be built with so little means.
Hundred and more is a tool for creativity training, an art game, a design game, a meditation aid. It can be used for taking a thought break, for finding ideas, for study purposes, to create art, to stimulate fantasy, as anchor for the soul to achieve relaxation, to play at being a builder, to activate both sides of the brain, to experiment, build sculptures, find new variants – to have endless fun – ages 4 to 100.
Despite its short existence, to this day the Bauhaus is considered one of the 20th century’s most important schools of architecture, design and art. Next year, the Bauhaus celebrates its 100th anniversary. Inspired by the ideas of the Bauhaus masters, author, designer and concrete artist Hans Karl Zeisel created a unique art-design book titled Hundred and more.
BUILDERS PLAY WITH BAUHAUS
It is an interactive book. The users can play at being builders and discover the Bauhaus world by themselves.
It is no coincidence that Hundred and more is being published by Edition Canz. “The publisher became internationally famous with the Bauhaus. In 1968, Canz published the catalogue of the famous Bauhaus exhibition in Stuttgart that later travelled the world. Since then, Canz has a name in the art world. So I am very pleased that Edition Canz is showcasing this unique art-design book on the Bauhaus anniversary”, explains editor and director Heinz Wurzel.
Hundred and more is both book and game. Hans Karl Zeisel proves how many abstract sculptures can be built with four simple wooden building blocks in red, yellow, blue and green, each one 7.4 x 7.4 centimetres long. In the enclosed booklet he creates 100 sculptures himself, and with the title “Hundred and more” he invites the users to explore even more variations. As Stuttgart journalist Adrienne Braun writes in the preface: “Suddenly one is astonished to discovery how exciting the interaction of profane surfaces, corners and borders, colours and shapes everywhere in this world is.”
As a designer, graphic artist and concrete artist, Hans Karl Zeisel has always considered himself a Bauhaus-oriented creator. “I came up with Hundred and More when I was once again looking for something playful that could be configured in different ways, something that could help foster, heighten and preserve creativity”, he explains. He had already designed a magnet-tile-based game with four coloured, two-dimensional squares on the occasion of the 100 years of Stankowski exhibition at the Staatsgalerie Stuttgart. With Hundred and More, he wanted to look into the third dimension and create small-scale sculptures for everyone. “With every new positioning or change, every builder becomes an artist”, Hans Karl Zeisel says.
MORE ABOUT HANS KARL ZEISEL
Hans Karl Zeisel has consistently put the fundamental idea of variety in simplicity into practice in numerous other works and concrete pieces.
Besides numerous concrete art works, he created a variable wall clock. A watch designed by him will also appear in 2019. Another game-design-book is likewise in development.
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HANS KARL ZEISEL
Typographer, graphic artist, designer, author
Lives and works in Korb, near Stuttgart, and in Budapest
He has held exhibitions in Berlin, Budapest, Munich, Paris, Pecs, Potsdam, Rome, Stuttgart, and many other cities.
INFLUENCED BY THE BAUHAUS
Faithful to linearity. Play with life’s shapes, circle, square, triangle. Exhaust, sound out, what is possible, what doesn’t yet exist. What can be done without abandoning clarity, concreteness. Experiment with colours, materials.
Curiosity towards new shapes, other combinations. Explore the material: what does it yield, how and where does it influence the work?
Discover new spaces, perspectives, points of view: always surprise with concrete art’s endless variety. Hans Karl Zeisel’s work can be briefly characterised this way. With his interactive book Hundred and more and his wall clock The M.O.M he has achieved this once again in an impressive, creative way.
HUNDRED AND MORE
Hundred and more is in German and English, and is composed of a 220-page, 14.8 × 14.8 cm book, and four colour, 7.4 × 7.4 cm wooden squares, which come in a stable cardboard box.
Available in well-sorted design and museum shops and in any place with books. Or directly from the publisher.
34.95 EUR (D)
35.95 EUR (A)
40.00 CHF (CH)