Aperiatur terra | Anselm Kiefer
Palmsonntag, 2006. Mixed Media, 215 x 141 x 11 cm.
Palmsonntag, 2006. Mixed Media, 215 x 141 x 11 cm
Palmsonntag, 2006. Mixed Media, 215 x 141 x 11 cm.
Palmsonntag, 2006. Mixed Media, 215 x 141 x 11 cm.
Palmsonntag, 2006. Mixed Media, 215 x 141 x 11 cm.
Palmsonntag, 2006. Mixed Media, 215 x 141 x 11 cm.
A key figure in European post-war culture, Anselm Kiefer’s art derives from his great awareness of history, theology, mythology, literature and philosophy, and his exploration of a range of materials such as lead, concrete, straw, clay, flowers and seeds.
Kiefer grew up in Germany close to the French border on the Rhine and looked to France as his spiritual home. His early work was influenced by Joseph Beuys and in the context of the immediate post-war period, Kiefer set out to understand Germany’s recent history, then still a taboo subject.In later work, the artist drew on German military history, Wagnerian mythology and Nazi architecture to grapple with the possibility of pursuing creativity in the light of catastrophic human suffering. Kiefer’s technique of layering paint and debris gives visceral life to his preoccupations with decay and re-creation.
After the reunification of Germany Kiefer moved to Barjac, a small town in the South of France, developing and widening his preoccupations. His study of ancient belief-systems such as the Kabbala and travel to South America, India, China and Australia expanded his interests to a cosmic view of the world. In Barjac he was able to work on an even larger scale and confronted with the natural world, became interested in theories about the lives of plants, the microcosm and macrocosm, and the concept that for every plant there exists a correlated star. The huge installation works of Palmsonntag (Palm Sunday), refer to the Christian holy day and suggests the balance between death and resurrection, decay and recreation so characteristic of Kiefer’s work.
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Aperiatur terra | Anselm Kiefer
Graham Howes: Anthony Bond: Norman Rosenthal
White Cube
2007
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B
All in the Present Must Be Transformed | Matthew Barney & Joseph Beuys
Chrysler Imperial (Detail), Matthew Barney; 2002
(Cast concrete, cast petroleum jelly, cast thermoplastic, stainless steel, marble and internally lubricated plastic)
Crewmaster 2: The Ballad of Max Jensen, Matthew Barney; 1999
Eurasia Sibirische Symphonie 1963 (Eurasia Siberian Symphony 1963), Joseph Beuys; 1966
(Felt, fat, hare, painted poles and wood panel with chalk drawing)
De Lama Lamina: Oxria d Ferro, Matthew Barney; 2005
(Oxidized iron powder, petroleum jelly and graphite on embossed paper in a self-lubricating plastic frame)
The Department of the Host & Unmoulding, Matthew Barney; 2006
(Cast polycarolactone thermoplastic and self-lubricating plastic)
Wie man dem toten Hasen die Bilder Erklärt (How to Explain Pictures to a Dead Hare), Joseph Beuys; November 26 1965
Terremoto, Joseph Beuys; 1981
(Typesetting machine with fat, Italian flag wrapped in felt, chalk on nine blackboards, metal container with fat and lead type, recorder with cassette and printed brochure)
Stuhl mit Fett (Fat Chair), Joseph Beuys; 1981
(Wooden chair with fat)
Matthew Barney’s The Crewmaster Cycle on Display at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; 2003
Unschlitt/Tallow, Joseph Beuys; 1977
(Twenty tons of tallow fat cut into six elements)
“Had it not been for the Tartars I would not be alive today. They were the nomads of the Crimea, in what was then no man’s land between the Russian and German fronts, and favoured neither side. I had already struck up a good relationship with them, and often wandered off to sit with them. ‘Du nix njemcky’ they would say, ‘du Tartar,’ and try to persuade me to join their clan. Their nomadic ways attracted me of course, although by that time their movements had been restricted. Yet it was they who discovered me in the snow after the crash, when the German search parties had given up. I was still unconscious then and only came round completely after twelve days or so, and by then I was back in a German field hospital. So the memories I have of that time are images that penetrated my consciousness. The last thing I remember was that it was too late to jump, too late for the parachutes to open. That must have been a couple of seconds before hitting the ground. Luckily I was not strapped in – I always preferred free movement to safety belts… My friend was strapped in and he was atomized on impact – there was almost nothing to be found of him afterwards. But I must have shot through the windscreen as it flew back at the same speed as the plane hit the ground and that saved me, though I had bad skull and jaw injuries. Then the tail flipped over and I was completely buried in the snow. That’s how the Tartars found me days later. I remember voices saying ‘Voda’ (Water), then the felt of their tents, and the dense pungent smell of cheese, fat and milk. They covered my body in fat to help it regenerate warmth, and wrapped it in felt as an insulator to keep warmth in.” – Joseph Beuys
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All in the Present Must Be Transformed: Matthew Barney & Joseph Beuys
Mark C. Taylor | Christian Scheidemann | Nat Trotman | Nancy Spector
The Deutsche Guggenheim, Berlin
2006
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The Deutsche Guggenheim, Berlin
A
12 | 2010
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12
Icons by Nirmala
21st January, 2010
Wunderkammer Studio
62 Ponsonby Rd, Auckland
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R
Fluxus | Fluxus, 1995
Joseph Beuys, Manifesto, 1970. Alteration of George Maciunas’ Fluxus Manifesto, February 1963.
From 1. Karton, Edition Hundermark, Berlin 1970. 30 x 21 cm
Fluxus Collective Editions, 1963 – 1965
Fluxus Street Events, March – May 1964. Photograph by George Maciunas
Dick Higgins, Danger Music No.2, 1962. Performance at Fluxus Internationale Festspiele Neuester Musik, Wiesbaden 1962. Photograph by Hartmut Rekort
George Maciunas, Dick Higgins, Wolf Vostell, Benjamin Patterson & Emmett Williams performing Philip Corner’s Piano Activities at Fluxus Internationale Festspiele Neuester Musik, Weisbaden 1962. Photograph by Hartmut Rekort
Takeshia Kosugi, Anima I & Ben Vautier, Attaché de Ben & George Maciunas, Solo for Violin.
Simultaneous performance, May 23rd 1964, by Ben Vautier and Alison Knowles (not pictured) during “Fluxus Street Theatre” as part of “Fluxus Festival at Fauxhall” New York City. Photography by George Maciunas. 51 x 40.5 cm
La Monte Young, The Tortoise Droning Selected Tigers From the Holy Numbers for the Two Black Tigers, The Green Tiger and the Hermit, from: The Tortoise, His Dreams and Journeys.
Performed 1964 at the Pocket Thetare, New York. From left; Tony Conrad, Marian Zazeela, La Monte Young and John Cale. Photo by George Maciunas
Fluxus is not: a movement, a moment in history, an organization. Fluxus is: an idea, a kind of work, a tendency, a way of life, a changing set of people who do Fluxworks -Dick Higgins.
Taken from the Latin word meaning “to flow”, the origins of Fluxus began in the early 1960s with Lithuanian born George Maciunas (1931 – 1978) who’s ideology quickly attracted a large network of artists, composers and designers who continue to express his extraordinary vision in the manifestation of anti-art, encompassing everything from music, photography, sculpture, installation, publications and pavement art to poetry and drama.
Beginning with a series of festivals featuring concerts of new experimental music and other avant-garde performance, Fluxus artists reacted against the commodity status of art, its commercialization in the gallery system, and its static presentation in traditional institutions. They often rejected the concept of artistic genius and single authorship in favor of a collective spirit and a collaborative practice.
Fluxus compositions or scores for performances and events involve simple actions, ideas, and objects from everyday life. Some scores, such as those in George Brecht’s Water Yam (1972), were printed on cards and then packaged into plastic boxes and sold as inexpensive multiples. These scores call for open-ended actions and events that can be performed by anyone at any time in any place. Also on view is Yoko Ono’s Invitation to Participate in a Water Event, in which she invited people to bring containers to her 1971 exhibition. These vessels were filled with water, displayed in the show, and labeled as collaborative works of art.
Sometimes a documentation or artifact from a Fluxus event became a work of art, a material presence that referred to an absent action or previous performance. Alison Knowles’ Journal of the Identical Lunch (1971), documents her ritual noontime performances at a New York diner with various artists and friends. In Dick Higgins’ ongoing series, The Thousand Symphonies, he composes musical scores with bullet holes and paint on sheet music. The result is both a documentation of the artist’s action and a work of visual art.
Incorporating musical compositions, concrete poetry, visual art, and writing, Fluxus performances embody Higgins’ idea of “intermedia”- a dialogue between two or more media to create a third, entirely new art form. Fluxus performance also incorporates actions and objects, artists and non-artists, art and everyday life in an attempt to find something “significant in the insignificant.” The influence of this highly experimental, spontaneous, often humorous form of performance art prevailed through the 1970s and has been rediscovered by a younger generation of artists working today.
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Fluxus
Thomas Kellein : George Maciunas : Jon Hendricks
Thames & Hudson
1995
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Radio Silence | A Selected Visual History of American Hardcore Music
Cassette Demos, 1985 – 89.
Antioch Arrow at 915 E. Street. San Diego, California, May 1993.
Hand Painted Leather Jacket, 1986.
Universal Order of Armageddon Demo, Vermin Scum Records, 1992.
Hand Drawn ‘Straight Edge’ T-Shirt, 1982.
Dance Floor at the Wilson Center, Summer 1982.
“Fuck You HBPD” Sticker, 1986.
Minor Threat, Salad Days 7″ (Back Cover Detail), Dischord Records, 1985.
Skate Rock Vol. 03, ‘Wild Riders of Boards’ 12″, High Speed Productions, 1985.
In the late 1960s, two bands hailing from Michigan laid the groundwork for punk. The Motor City Five and The Stooges aren’t the center ring on punk’s tree, but they stand as the most recognizable starting point. Both bands’ revved-up version of the blues garnered attention, major label deals, and devout fans, but the landscape wasn’t yet ripe for a revolution. Ultimately, a shitload of heroin and the typical cast of clueless suits caused both bands to end prematurely.
And while wearing swastikas for shock value, disrespecting the Royal Family, and displaying a disdain for anything considered “normal” was punk’s calling card, its roots remained firmly in the streets of New York, the art scene of Los Angeles, and London fashion; places totally foreign to kids in suburban America. As romantic as it was to be a starving artist living like shit in New York City most kids just fucking hated their parents and liked to light fires in the woods.
As punk migrated to the suburbs the sound and attitude changed. Something snapped in American culture; kids who loved the speed and fuck you attitude of punk took hold of its spirit, got rid of the “live fast, die young” bullshit and made a revision: hardcore. It wasn’t a direct fuck you to punk’s aesthetic and sound, hardcore was moving too fast to give a shit. With an actor elected as President and a defense initiative named after Star Wars, the decade was as dire as it was absurd. Cocaine was huge, AIDS surfaced as global epidemic, and the suburbs were really fucking boring. Hardcore’s direct and naïve stood out as the most honest commentary put to music at the time.
– Anthony Pappalardo, Instinct and Attitude: The Art of Necessity
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Radio Silence| A Selected Visual History of American Hardcore Music
Nathan Nedorostek : Anthony Pappalardo
MTV Press
2008
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A
Te Tuhirangi Contour, Richard Serra
Te Tuhirangi Contour, Richard Serra, 1999/2001
Kaipara, North Island, New Zealand.
Weatherproof steel, 6m x 257m x 5cm.
The site of “Te Tuhirangi Contour” is on the Kaipara harbour, 45km north of Auckland. The site is a vast open grass pasture with rolling elevations. The elevational fall of the land establishes curvilinear contours. The sculpture is located on one continuos contour, at a length of 257m. The particular contour was chosen for its location, differentiation, contraction and expansion in relation to the volume of the landscape. The elevation of the sculpture is perpendicular to the fall of the land which generates its lean of 11 degrees. The work was mocked-up full scale in wood to determine height and length. All images by German photographer Dirk Reinartz.
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B
History of Our World 
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