OPENING
Sunday, March 29, 2026
12 noon
Welcome: Felix Heinrichs, Mayor of the City of Mönchengladbach
Introduction: Susanne Titz and Alke Heykes
2 pm
Artist Talk with Grant Mooney and Alke Heykes
The US artist Grant Mooney (b. 1990, Seattle, WA; lives and works in Brooklyn, New York) develops sculptural work that treats material not as a static given but as a relational configuration. Through techniques of fabrication, joining, and sealing—such as soldering and electroplating—Mooney transforms precious metals and industrial materials, including silver and steel, into ascetic abstract objects whose presence is defined less by form than by their relationship to space and environment. In his engagement with sculptural processes, Mooney makes visible the layered contexts and relationships of materials and forms, generating new and unexpected constellations. His works operate in the tension between autonomous, abstract, and site-specific sculpture, articulating an open, tactile, and interconnected understanding of sculptural work.
The exhibition sum at Museum Abteiberg examines the behavior of materials across historical and contemporary artistic positions. Taking Mooney’s sculptural approach as its point of departure, the exhibition reconsiders the architectural and conceptual specificities of the museum alongside key developments in (post-)modern sculpture and places them in dialogue with current practices. sum brings together new and existing works by Mooney, works by other contemporary artists and from the collection of Museum Abteiberg, and selected loans.
A multilayered exhibition structure emerges through a dialogue between defining categories of Minimal Art and Conceptualism—such as weight, density, and mass—and immaterial forces including biochemical processes and atmospheric change. A new body of work by Mooney, produced in collaboration with the Chisenhale Gallery, London foregrounds air and its movement as sculptural substance and triggers spatial-material exchanges. This group includes a harp designed by the artist that vibrates not through touch but through the elemental force of air and will be installed on the museum roof. Like this instrument, the other works allow external forces to act upon them in different ways, opening themselves to fragility and transformation. The ephemeral and the immeasurable become central points of reference, opening new perspectives on material, space, and perception.
SAVE THE DATE
Sunday, April 19, 2026, 2 pm
SOUND PERFORMANCE
Dylan Kerr presents Substratum, a composition for voice and fixed electronics that draws inspiration from the Hindustani Dhrupad tradition.
The exhibition sum was developed jointly by Alke Heykes and Grant Mooney.
The exhibition is generously supported by the Kunststiftung NRW and the Hans Fries Foundation.
sum includes a new body of work by Grant Mooney that was commissioned and produced by Chisenhale Gallery, London in partnership with Museum Abteiberg. The commission was on display at Chisenhale Gallery from September 26 to December 7, 2025, as part of the exhibition sphere music
Museum Abteiberg would like to thank Miguel Abreu Gallery, New York, for its support.
Fig.: Grant Mooney, sphere music, 2025, Installation view, Chisenhale Gallery, London, 2025, Foto: Andy Keat