For 30 years, 57-year-old Manfred Webel has been working in inclusive participatory projects with people of all ages and social and cultural backgrounds on the question of how art and sculptures in particular can contribute to an open urban community. For this he has developed so-called movement sculptures - sculptures that can be touched, moved and "liberated". With their organic design language in mostly powerful, warm red tones, they almost invite you to touch them: “As a sculptor, my hands are very close to the material. This physical friction and exertion, this joy in kneading clay, bending steel, this happiness when shapes slowly appear, I love to share with other people.” Because for him it's not just about the right form, it's more about the call for communication that he creates in the sculptures. With his movable art container, Manfred Webel creates a social meeting place where people can come together, exchange ideas and become creative themselves. The connecting element is always the dialogue with his sculptures. In doing so, he is looking for answers to the question of what social dynamics can develop in the triad of sculpture, space and people and what influence the form has on coexistence.

In order to make a physical interaction possible, there are some artistic challenges in the development of the objects in terms of their surface texture and size. Webel's sculptures are therefore always adapted to the dimensions of the human body. Some are so small that a child's hand can grasp them, but they can also be so large that they can only be moved by several adults together. But they are never monumental, because that would make direct access more difficult. Due to their surface, their weight and their volume, the movement sculptures are tailored to people's strength and dexterity, because the moment they are touched, they move. In playing with the sculptures, new perspectives can therefore be constantly experienced, even with minimal changes of location.

“By taking movement sculptures with other people out of their usual environment, for example out of the studio, to a certain extent free them, I influence the effect of the sculptures in space. You come into a new environment, ready for face-to-face encounters with people: I then call it the sculpture arena.” In Marl, Webel occupies this space for the first time with a green path connection between the sculpture museum, the mobile art container and the Martin-Luther-King comprehensive school. People can then interact with his sculptures on these green connecting paths and experience what art and sculpture can express and achieve; art is created and culture is lived.

During his stay in Marl, Manfred Webel will be accompanied by Angela Behler, who will conduct a playful visitor survey on understanding art, and fashion designer Laura Schlütz, who will offer a hands-on activity for dressing sculptures. In addition, the entertaining program is supported by the cartoonist André Sedlaczek, who draws humorous encounters with sculptures together with the audience, and the cameraman Lukas Günther, who shoots film scenes of people in action with sculptures.

Please touch, Marl! takes place from 10 to 18 September 2022 daily from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m., Saturday and Sunday from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. at the Marl Skulpturenmuseum on Georg-Herwegh-Straße 67 in Marl. On Sunday, September 18 at 12 noon, all the works that have been developed with the public will be presented in a finissage.

Please touch, Marl! takes place as a special network project of the Kultursekretariat NRW Gütersloh and is funded by the Ministry for Culture and Science of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia