Jörg Obergfell uses everyday objects and found objects such as tree leaves, branches, and discarded facial tissues on street floors to create small-scale models of urban scenery. The scale models he creates using wood, flyers, and magazines as the main material express condensed narratives taken from his surroundings. Obergfell juxtaposes buildings and other urban architectural structures against objects he artificially crafted with daily-life materials to discuss “adaptation,” his chief subject matter.

Obergfell was trained in a vocational woodcarving school, studied in the Academy of Fine Arts, Nuremberg, Germany, and received an MFA from Goldsmiths College, London, UK. Obergfell’s first solo exhibition was held at Kunstmuseum Stuttgart in 2005, and he was subsequently shown in numerous one-man exhibitions held at Second Nature, Gallery Muro, Geneva (2010), CEAAC, Strasbourg (2011), and Gallery EM, Seoul (2013 and 2017), among others. His honors include Black Forest Culture Award, Germany (2006), a postgraduate scholarship from Arts and Humanities Research Council, UK (2006), and residencies at Changdong Art Studio, Korea (2007), ACAC, Japan (2013 and 2016), and Cité Internationale des Arts, France (2011).