Externes Schreiben - Lentos Kunstmuseum Linz

Externes Schreiben - Lentos Kunstmuseum Linz

LENTOS Kunstmuseum Linz
Information Sheet
ICH KENNE KEIN WEEKEND
The Archive and Collection of René Block
DVR-Nummer 0002852
18 March until 5 June 2015
LENTOS Kunstmuseum Linz, A-4021 Linz, Ernst-Koref-Promenade 1
Tel: +43 (0)732.7070-3600 Fax: +43 (0)732.7070-3604 www.lentos.at
Content
Exhibition Facts …………………………………………………………………………..
3
Press Text ……………………………………………………………………………………
4
Exhibition Booklets .…………………………………………………………………………….. 5
Press Images ………………………………………………………………………………..
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14
Exhibition Facts
Exhibition Title
ICH KENNE KEIN WEEKEND
The Archive and Collection of René Block
Exhibition Period
18 March until 5 June 2016
Opening
Thursday, 17 March 2016, 7 pm
Press Conference
Thursday, 17 March 2016, 09:30 am
Exhibition Venue
LENTOS Kunstmuseum Linz, upper floor
Curators
Marius Babias, Stella Rollig
Exhibits
Exhibits and archive documents from the René Block`s archive and
collection
Publication
The exhibition is accompanied by an extensive publication with the
collected texts by René Block and a detailed chronology. It is
edited by Marius Babias, Birgit Eusterschulte and Stella Rollig,
published by Verlag der Buchhandlung Walther König, Cologne,
540 pages with numerous illustrations, € 39,80 (Prize at the
museum € 29).
Magazine
A magazine, compiled by René Block, adds to the exhibition with
background information and contributions by various authors, 120
p., more than 300 images, € 3
Exhibition Booklet There is an exhibition booklets available with information. Their
purpose is to facilitate the visitors’ individual approach to the
artworks.
Contact
Ernst-Koref-Promenade 1, 4020 Linz, Tel. +43(0)732/7070-3600;
[email protected], www.lentos.at
Opening Hours
Tue–Sun 10am to 6pm, Thur 10am to 9pm, Mon closed
Admission
€ 8; concessions € 6
Press Contact
Johanna Hofer, T +43(0)732.7070.3603, [email protected]
Available at the Press Conference:
Bernhard Baier, Deputy Mayor and Head of Municipal Department of Culture
Stella Rollig, Director LENTOS Kunstmuseum Linz, Marius Babia, Director Neuer
Berliner Kunstverein as well as René Block.
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Press Text
The LENTOS is dedicating a show to the manifold and interdisciplinary
work of gallery owner and exhibition organizer René Block. Being one of
the pioneers to promote intermedia art, Fluxus and happenings, René
Block played a decisive role in the Neo-Avantgarde. As director and
initiator of numerous biennials worldwide, Block established a unique story of tracking,
showing, collecting and exhibiting modern art.
Block’s career began in 1964 in West Berlin, where he opened his gallery with the
legendary show Neodada, Pop, Décollage, Kapitalistischer Realismus, presenting at the
time unknown artists such as Joseph Beuys, Nam June Paik, Sigmar Polke and Gerhard
Richter. The LENTOS presents works of art and favorite pieces from the curatorial work
of René Block since 1964 as well as materials, documents, photographs and films from
his archive. Additionally on show, there are works of art created on the occasion of
numerous exhibition projects.
The exhibition was developed by the Neuer Berliner Kunsterverein (n.b.k.) and is a
collaborative venture of n.b.k, Berlinisches Galerie-Museum für moderne Kunst and the
LENTOS Kunstmuseum Linz.
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Wall Texts
1964 René Block opened the legendary Neodada, Pop, Décollage, Capitalist Realism
exhibition in a small basement space in Berlin-Schöneberg. From then on his gallery
introduced Berlin to the most recent art by previously unknown artists such as Joseph
Beuys, Gerhard Richter, Sigmar Polke, Nam June Paik and Wolf Vostell. As art dealer
and project supervisor of the DAAD’s (German Academic Exchange Service) Artists-inBerlin Programme between 1982 and 1992, Block was one of the key figures of neoavant-gardism. A pioneer of the multiple, who quickly made a name for himself as a
publisher of prints, Block’s primary concern was the democratization of art, which went
hand in hand with a new self-conception on the part of artists. How can art be expanded
to encompass diverse media? How can it be reconceived in close proximity to literature,
music, performance and theatre?
The interdisciplinarity of the visual arts seems self-evident today, but in the 1960s and
early 1970s Block was a pioneer and trailblazer for new art forms. During his
international career− as artistic director of the Kunsthalle Fridericianum in Kassel from
1998− 2006 and as the curator of numerous biennales, for example in Istanbul and
Sydney− René Block has left a unique record by discovering, showing, collecting and
exhibiting modern art.
The exhibition brings this story to life with documents, photographs and films from the
Block Archive dating from 1964 to 2014 and combines them with selected works from his
collection.
Print Cabinet
Block came to Berlin from the Rhineland in the summer of 1963 to continue his art
studies. In May 1964 he opened the “Cabinet René Block. Grafisches Kabinett der
Freien Galerie” above the rooms of Dieter Ruckhaberle’s “Freier Galerie” on
Kurfürstenstrasse. In quick succession he put on two exhibitions featuring prints by Klaus
Peter Brehmer and Bert Gerresheim. Block cultivated close relationships with artists,
critics and the Berlin public. Within weeks he conceived the idea of breaking away from
the Freie Galerie and all it stood for and founding a gallery of his own. Galerie René
Block opened in September 1964.
The Cabinet published two print editions on the occasion of the exhibitions, which sold
for 10 DM a copy. As an artistic experiment, Block issued Brehmer’s first machinemade original color print. Signed and numbered, its price was only 3 DM. In addition, the
Spandauer Volksblatt newspaper published an original print made from Brehmer’s
specially prepared printing block to accompany its exhibition review. In this way, 30,000
newspaper buyers each received an original work of art.
First Years and Capitalist Realism
The term “Capitalist Realism” was coined in 1963 by Gerhard Richter, Sigmar Polke,
Konrad Lueg and Manfred Kuttner. This was the label these artists used for a number of
artistic actions in and around Düsseldorf. Block was fascinated by the ability of these
artists to make their art reflect the current social situation in the Federal Republic, which
was marked by post-war reconstruction and the repression of National Socialism. When
he opened his gallery on September 15, 1964, Block therefore gave his first exhibition
the title Neodada, Pop, Décollage, Capitalist Realism. The transfer of the phrase
“Capitalist Realism” from the Rhineland, where the high profile of the so-called
economic miracle had lent it anti-consumerist overtones, to the divided city of Berlin,
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which was then defined by the Cold War, resulted in the term acquiring additional
sociocritical layers of meaning in the particular context of West Berlin, a process that
was enhanced by the advent of artists such as KP Brehmer, K. H. Hödicke and
Wolf Vostell.
Early Actions
Action art, performances and happenings put in their first appearance in the second half
of the 20th century. And in Berlin of the 1960s and ‘70s it was the Galerie Block that led
the way. The gallery’s first action, Stanley Brouwn’s This Way Brouwn, took place
during the gallery’s first exhibition in 1964. The Surinam born artist was obsessed with
measuring the world literally step by step. He asked passers-by to record their way to the
Galerie Bock. Brouwn’s action promptly came to a tumultuous conclusion.
Many actions did not restrict themselves to the gallery space proper but also extended
into the city: Wolf Vostell carried out a happening in a junkyard and Nam June Paik in
front of the Brandenburg Gate. Bazon Brock staged experimental theatre on the
Kurfürstendamm. In the Installation Raum der Realität − Axel-Springer-Denkmal: Immer
daran denken [Room for Reality – Axel Springer Monument: Keep thinking of it],
1963/65 he inserted barbed wire barriers between household utensils und pieces of
furniture.
By 1967, the Forum Theater on Berlin’s Kurfürstendamm had become the
Galerie Block’s second venue, specializing in film evenings, concerts, festivals
and performances. The concerts ranged from jazz and modern classical music
to the electronic sounds of Tangerine Dream. Gilbert & George appeared there
as “living sculptures” and films by Richard Hamilton and Dan Graham were
screened. In 1970, the Forum Theater hosted the Festum Fluxorum Fluxus
festival.
Actions by Joseph Beuys
There is hardly another artistic oeuvre with which René Block as an art dealer is as
closely associated as with that of Joseph Beuys. Beuys’s first solo action in the gallery,
the Fluxus chant The Chief in December 1964, was followedby other installations,
actions and concerts. They include the 1969 concert I try to set (make) you free in the
Akademie der Künste, Berlin, which had to be terminated prematurely due to rampaging
spectators, and the Sweeping Up action in Karl-Marx-Platz in Berlin-Neukölln that can be
seen as a commentary on the city’s May Day demonstrations.
Allan Kaprow: Sweet Wall
In November 1970 the American action artist Allan Kaprow organized the happening
Sweet Wall in collaboration with the Galerie Block. On a bombed-out site near
Potsdamer Platz he and several participants erected an approximately 30-meter-long
wall, using concrete blocks, bread and jam as mortar. They built the wall in just a few
hours and then immediately joined forces to knock it down again.
For Kaprow, Sweet Wall was a parody of the Berlin Wall standing within sight of the
happening in particular and of border walls in general. Dick Higgins documented the
happening in photographs that were later published by Edition Block as the art book
Sweet Wall/Testimonials.
Fluxus
The Fluxus art movement originated in New York during the 1950s and grew
rapidly into a network with branches around the world. With its actions,
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happenings and festivals as standard components, Fluxus transcends the
boundaries between the performing and the visual arts. The name Fluxus (Latin:
fluxus = flow or flux) already suggests that here the transitions to music, theatre
and everyday life are fluid.
The Galerie Block was the venue of numerous Fluxus exhibitions and actions
by such artists as George Brecht, Robert Filliou, Wolf Vostell, Nam June Paik,
Arthur Køpcke, Dieter Roth and George Maciunas, the pioneer of the Fluxus
movement. Along with Wiesbaden, Berlin became a centre of the German
Fluxus movement. In his New York gallery René Block similarly exhibited
American Fluxus artists who were not represented by any gallery in their native
country.
Block curated Fluxus retrospectives in the 1980s and ’90s, including
exhibitions in Wiesbaden in 1982, 1992 and 2002, where Germany’s
first Fluxus Festival had taken place in 1962. His commitment to Fluxus
becomes apparent also from a touring exhibition organised by the Institut für
Auslandsbeziehungen (ifa, the Institute for Foreign Relations) in Stuttgart: Eine
lange Geschichte mit vielen Knoten. Fluxus in Deutschland 1962–1994.
Blockade ‘69
In 1969 a series of exhibitions entitled Blockade ‘69 opened at the Galerie
René Block. Eight artists were each given the opportunity to arrange their own
exhibition in the gallery. The underlying idea was the inseparable link between
work, presentation and space.
Beuys exhibited the grand piano that had been damaged at the Akademie der
Künste during his I try to set (make) you free concert along with relics from that
action. Inspired by a piece composed by Henning Christiansen that was being
played simultaneously, Palermo marked corners and edges of the room with
minimalist wall drawings. K. H. Hödicke installed a living artwork in the white
space by way of a chicken coop with white poultry. IMI Knoebel projected blank
slides as a light event. Reiner Ruthenbeck developed a space blockade made
of stretched strips of fabric. Sigmar Polke “imagined that a particle was orbiting
this room” and placed this message in individual letters on the floor.
These changes taking place in the same venue opened up the interpretation of
art under the aspects of action, experience and intellectual process.
In 1970 Block showed a series of sound art installations called Acoustic Spaces
designed by artists such as Mauricio Kagel, Conrad Schnitzler and Wolf Vostell.
Klangkunst
Joseph Beuys’s very first action at the Galerie Block, The Chief, subtitled Fluxus
Chant, already belonged to the domain of sound. Block brought a wide range
of sound art to Berlin, starting with his gallery’s first concert in 1965 featuring
Nam June Paik and Charlotte Moorman. Concerts in the gallery’s own spaces
and in the Forum Theater were firmly established parts of the Galerie Block’s
programme.
Sound art meant concerts, sound objects, happenings and installations. The
1976 exhibition New York - Downtown Manhattan: SoHo had already been
remarkable for its high-profile performance and concert programme.
Paris Biennale
The highlights of Block’s musical and sound arrt activities include Musik in
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Containern (Music in Containers) as part of the Section Son (Section Sound)
at the Paris Biennale 1985.
The Nouvelle Biennale de Paris, curated by Kasper König and Achile Bonito Oliva took
place in early 1985 in Paris’s newly opened Parc de la Villette. Block was responsible
for the sound installations within the Biennale’s sound section. In ten containers
positioned in front of the Grande Halle de la Villette he presented works and
performances by the American sound poets and composers Bill Fontana and Terry Fox,
the French composer Philippe Fénelon, the Berlin sound artist Rolf Julius and Michel
Waisvisz from the Netherlands, among others. The initial idea of subsequently shipping
the containers by train to other European cities could not be realized.
René Block Gallery New York
Block’s most important venture as a gallerist was surely the Beuys action I like America
and America likes me on the occasion of the opening of his New York gallery in 1974,
which brought both men international fame. Beuys famously locked himself into a room
at the New York gallery which was also occupied by a wild coyote.
After its spectacular opening with I like America and America likes me the René Block
Gallery put on a succession of exhibitions of: KP Brehmer, K. H. Hödicke, Rebecca Horn,
Reiner Ruthenbeck – and Fluxus artists resident in New York such as Robert Watts,
Geoffrey Hendricks, Nam June Paik, Shigeko Kubota and Joe Jones. Even though the
Gallery managed to pull off several important deals it was forced to close after three
years when the property in which it was housed changed hands. Block summed up the
experiences he had made as a gallerist in New York in the 1976 Berlin exhibition New
York – Downtown Manhattan: SoHo.
The Beuys environment Richtkräfte ‘74 (Directional Forces 74) shown in New York is
acquired for the Neue Nationalgalerie in Berlin, Nam June Paik’s installation The Moon
is the oldest TV Set goes to the Centre Pompidou in Paris.
Szene Berlin and Kunstmarkt
After a fact-finding visit devoted to art in Berlin, Uwe Schneede, then director of the
Württembergischer Kunstverein in Stuttgart, invited the art dealer Block to put together
an exhibition on Berlin’s unknown art scene. In order to include foreign artists, the
guests of the DAAD’s Artists-in-Berlin Program, Block developed the concept of
transporting the scene of a specific month. As a consequence, the Stuttgart exhibition
and the subsequent shows in London and Hamburg each presented different artists.
DAAD artists were included in a Berlin exhibition for the first time.
In 1966 Block was invited to join the Verein progressiver deutscher Kunsthändler, the
Association of German Progressive Art Dealers. Only a year later, the Association
organised the first Kölner Kunstmarkt, which was to morph into Art Cologne eventually.
The spectacular sale of Joseph Beuys’s installation The Pack at the 1969 Kölner
Kunstmarkt represented the gallerist’s first major success. The same year saw
Berlin’s art dealers band together and pool their resources to put on the first
International Berlin Spring Fair, in which Block likewise participated. The “discontent
with the art market”, which he articulated in the 1971 trade fair catalogue, led him to
rebrand the 4th Berlin Spring Fair in 1972 as the “First Trade Fair for Multiplied Art”.
Multiplied art was to become an instrument with which to democratize art. The
commercialization of the art market, boosted especially by Art Basel, led to Galerie
Block’s complete withdrawal from art fairs since 1975.
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Biennalen
Biennales play a special role in the world of contemporary art. They are not merely
exhibitions that take place every other year. Since the 1990s at the latest, biennales
serve as barometers gauging the state of the visual arts in various places around the
world. Modelled after the Venice Biennale, one of the world’s most important art
events, the term “biennale” has become synonymous for a system of internationally
networked group exhibitions.
Block participated in the conception and realisation of numerous biennales. Towards a
Biennale of Peace, for example, was shown at the Hamburger Kunstverein in 1985.
Block served as artistic director of the biennales at Sydney 1990 and Istanbul 1995. The
Cetinje Biennale 2004 formed the conclusion of the Balkans Trilogy and Block curated a
section of the biennale at the South Korean city of Gwangju 2000. These globally
oriented biennales not only introduce regional art scenes to international audiences but
in turn also offer important impulses for local artists.
Paris, 1985
Nouvelle Biennale de Paris [New Paris Biennale]
Section Sound. Sound installations in ten containers located in front of the
Grande Halle de la Villette
Hamburg, 1985
For an Art-of-Peace Biennale
Sydney, 1990
The Readymade Boomerang. Certain Relations in 20th Century Art,
8th Biennale of Sydney
Istanbul, 1995
Orient/ation, 4th International Istanbul Bienniale
Gwangju, 2000
Man + Space, 3rd Gwangju Biennale
Eurafrica, Section Europe and Africa
Cetinje, 2004
Love It or Leave It, Cetinje Biennale V
Belgrade, 2006
Art, Life & Confusion, 47th October Salon
Venice, 2007
Welfare – Fare Well. Nordic Pavilion and Alvar Aalto Pavilion
52nd Venice Biennale
Lidice
The Hommage à Lidice exhibition 1967 references a massacre perpetrated by German
soldiers during World War II. On June 10, 1942, all male inhabitants of the Czech village
Lidice older than fifteen years of age were murdered in retaliation for the assassination of
Reinhard Heydrich, the Deputy Reich Protector of Bohemia and Moravia. The women
and children were deported and the village razed to the ground.
In 1967 the chairman of the International Lidice Committee called on artists to donate
works for a museum that was planned for the memorial in Lidice. Block supported this
action and invited 21 artists to take part. The result was a unique collection of works by
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West Germany’s avant-garde that Block himself brought to Prague in early 1968. The
collection was long considered lost after the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in August
of that year. When it was rediscovered in 1996 Block added works by 31 artists of the
younger generation that had been part of the Pro Lidice exhibition. These works now
make up the core of the art collection at Lidice. In 2015 a new chapter entitled
Remember Lidice was added to the project. While the first two events had relied
exclusively on German artists. Remember Lidice assembles works by 44 international
artists.
Art Allemagne Ajourd`hui
With its 1981 exhibition Art Allemagne Aujourd’hui (Art Germany Today), the Musée
d’art moderne de la ville de Paris presented the first comprehensive overview of
contemporary art in Germany to be shown in France. The ARC’s director, Suzanne
Pagé, and Block selected established positions like Gerhard Richter, Hanne Darboven,
Hans Haacke and Joseph Beuys and artists who were then still comparatively unknown,
like Isa Genzken, Anselm Kiefer, Thomas Schütte und Jörg Immendorff. More than 40
artists took part in the exhibition. The catalogue features an extensively researched
chronological compilation of national and international artistic and cultural events since
1945. It also analyzed the results of a survey Block conducted among museums and
galleries.
Liberated Sound / Plans for upper Austria’s 1988 regional
exhibition
Two projects link Block to the City of Linz and the region. One is Upper Austria’s
regional exhibition, Der befreite Klang. Kunst für Augen und Ohren (Liberated Sound. Art
for Eyes and Ears), which was planned for 1988, the other an invitation by Ars
Electronica 1988 to take charge of several sound installations in the Donaupark.
In 1988, Upper Austria’s regional exhibition was to have been devoted to the border
area between fine art and music. The venue designated for the exhibition, the newly
restored Weinberg Castle in Kefermarkt, was to be made to resonate with the exhibition
and the concerts that were to accompany it. Conceived under the aegis of Wieland
Schmied, the exhibition involved contemporary artists and composers such as Connie
Beckley, John Cage, Dick Higgins, Laurie Anderson, La Monte Young and Yannis
Xennakis, who had been commissioned with creating works especially suited to
Weinberg and its environs.
In the autumn of 1987, the exhibition was cancelled at short notice, only a few months
before it was due to open. For his decision, the governor of Upper Austria cited
differences of opinion concerning the conception of the exhibition and misgivings about
the lack of support from the local population. Having thus been deprived of his role in the
regional exhibition, Block concentrated on projects by Henning Christiansen, Joe Jones
and Yoshimasa Wada at the Klang-Park of Ars Electronica 1988.
Block oversaw two curatorial projects in Austria, the exhibition Über Malerei –
Begegnungen mit der Geschichte (On Painting – Encounters with History) in 1992 to
celebrate the 300th anniversary of the foundation of the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna
and the exhibition Eine kleine Machtmusik. Bericht aus dem Depot (A Little Might Music.
Report from the Depot) at the Essl Museum in Klosterneuburg in 2013.
Editions and Multiples
Art objects issued in limited editions known as multiples represent a fundamental
innovation in the history of 20th century art. They adhere to a democratic idea, namely
the availability of reasonably priced art for everyone. The multiple is hence surrounded
by an aura of rebellion because it sets itself up as an alternative to high-priced originals.
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Multiples play an important role in René Block’s work. Since 1966, he has published a
large number of editions which were conceived together with the artists. Block regularly
extolled the cultural significance of the multiple, for example at the 1972 “First Trade
Fair for Multiplied Art” in Berlin, which he coinitiated, and at his 1974 Multiples
exhibition dealing with the history of this art form at the Neuer Berliner Kunstverein.
In 1968 the Edition Block published Joseph Beuys’s first multiple, Evervess II 1, and
with Nam June Paik’s The Thinker (TV-Rodin), Block issued the very first video multiple
in 1976/78. Joseph Beuys’s Sled, produced in 1969 in the context of his installation
The Pack, Richard Hamiltons The Critic Laughs 1968-71 and The Manuscript by Marcel
Broodthaers 1974 are among the best known multiples to be published by the Edition
Block. More recently published editions include multiples by Mona Hatoum, Olaf Metzel,
Ayşe Erkmen and Alicja Kwade.
The Bofinger Chair as an object
A 1971 cooperative project between the Galerie Block and the Modus furniture store in
Berlin-Charlottenburg resulted in a number of artworks that focused on a classic of
modern design: the so-called Bofinger Chair designed in 1964 by Helmut Bätzner.
Bofinger provided the artists with as many chairs in whatever colours they desired.
Alongside the chairs on show here by K. H. Hödicke, Sigmar Polke, Tomas Schmit and
Günter Uecker, there were also chairs styled by Joseph Beuys, KP Brehmer, H. J.
Dietrich, Dieter Roth, Wolf Vostell and Stefan Wewerka.
DAAD / Ifa
Between 1982 and 1992 Block was Head of Fine Arts Projects in the DAAD’s
Artists-in-Berlin programme. From 1984 he was also in charge of the
programme’s musical activities. In this period, his remit included responsibility
for the exhibition programme of the DAAD Gallery and for the artists and
composers who had come to Berlin on a DAAD scholarship.
Between 1993 and 1995 Block was head of the exhibition service of the Institut
für Auslandsbeziehungen (ifa), the institute in charge of the presentation of
German artists in countries outside Germany. Particularly noteworthy in this
context, in addition to solo exhibitions by Günther Uecker und Hanne Darboven,
were the exhibitions Leiblicher Logos. 14 Künstlerinnen aus Deutschland
(Embodied Logos. 14 Women Artists from Germany) in 1995, Künstlerbücher
in Deutschland (Artists’ books in Germany) and the great exhibition Eine lange
Geschichte mit vielen Knoten. Fluxus in Deutschland (A long story with many
knots. Fluxus in Germany) which toured the world for many years.
TANAS
The Instanbul Biennale brought a steady increase in contacts with Turkey. In
joint ventures with the Vehbi Koç Foundation and the Yapi Kredi publishing
house Block edited a series of monographs on Turkish contemporary art and
put on a slew of exhibitions of works by contemporary Turkish artists such as
Hale Tenger, Esra Esren, Gülsün Karamustafa und Gengiz Çekil.
In 2008 René Block opened a non-commercial venue for contemporary art in
Berlin called TANAS, the product of his close collaboration with the Vehbi Koç
Foundation in Istanbul. The word TANAS is an anagram of sanat, the Turkish
word for art.
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The end of Block´s activities as a gallerist
After the series of exhibitions Blockade ´69 and the 1970 Akustische Räume
(Acoustic Spaces) the programme of the Galerie Block began to include a
growing number of international artists. Particularly noteworthy were exhibitions
of works by Richard Hamilton, the twin exhibition Minimal Art USA und Neue
Monumente Deutschland in 1968 and the first Marcel Duchamp exhibition in
Berlin in 1971.
Many artists who had come to Berlin at the invitation of the DAAD’s Artists-inBerlin Programme put on exhibitions at the Galerie Block, which resulted in
the gallerist’s close collaboration with the DAAD. He realized exhibitions with
Piotr Kowalski, Dan Graham, Roman Opalka, Braco Dimitrijević, James Lee
Byars, Endre Tót and especially On Kawara, with whom the gallerist had been
personally acquainted since his time in New York.
A spectacular action also accompanied the 1979 closing of the Berlin gallery,
15 years to the day from its opening. For the exhibition Ja, jetzt brechen wir hier
den Scheiß ab (Yeah, Let’s Stop This Shit Now) Beuys had the plaster removed
from the walls and arranged five spatial installations as a retrospective of his 15
years of collaboration with Block.
Fridericianum Kassel
From 1998 to 2005 Block headed the Museum Fridericianum (since 2001 Kunsthalle
Fridericianum) in Kassel. After a number of international biennales Kassel offered him
the opportunity to develop a complex long-term programmatic structure for a single
venue.
Block began in 1998 with Echolot oder 9 Fragen an die Peripherie (Echo Sounder or 9
Questions to the Periphery), an exhibition presenting works by artists from Iran,
Lebanon, Turkey, Egypt, China, Korea and Australia that addressed such themes as
geographical periphery, cultural identity and the Western art business. The exhibition Toi
Toi Toi. Drei Künstlergenerationen aus Neuseeland (Toi Toi Toi. Three generations of
artists from New Zealand) explored the art scene in New Zealand, after Australia had first
attracted attention in the 1980s. In den Schluchten des Balkan. Eine Reportage [In the
Gorges of the Balkans. A Reportage] from 2003 made up the start of the Balkans Trilogy,
a series of exhibitions lasting over a year devoted to the art scene in Southeast Europe.
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Press Images
Press Images available for download at www.lentos.at.
Free use of press images only in conjunction with the relevant exhibition.
Joseph Beuys, René Block, Installation of the
Joseph Beuys, René Block,
Nam June Paik, The Thinker, 1976/1978,
exhibition Ja, jetzt brechen wir hier den Scheiß
Installation of the exhibition
Sammlung Block, on loan in the Neues Museum
ab (Yeah, Let`s Stop This Shit Now), Galerie
„Richtkräfte `74“ (Directional
in Nürnberg, Photo: Archiv Block
René Block, Berlin 1979,
Forces 74), René Block Gallery,
Photo: Christiane Hartmann
New York 1975,
Photo: Archiv Block
Allan Kaprow, Sweet Wall, Berlin 1970, Photo:
Archiv Block
Aydan Murtezaoğlu, Untitled (Antenna), 2000,
René Block im Büro seiner
Sammlung Block, on loan in the Neues Museum
Galerie mit Plakat Hommage à
in Nürnberg, Photo: Sammlung Block
Berlin, 1969, Photo: KP Brehmer /
KP Brehmer Nachlass, Berlin
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Aydan Murtezaoglu, At Room Temperature, 20002003, Sammlung Block. On Loan in the Neues
Museum in Nürnberg
René Block in der Galerie vor
Gerhard Richters „Prinz Sturdza“
Mangelos, Energija, 1978, Sammlung Block. On
(1964), 1966, Photo: KP Brehmer
loan in the Neues Museum in Nürnberg,
/ KP Brehmer Nachlass, Berlin
Photo: Neues Museum in Nürnberg (Annette
Kradisch)
Exhibition View Ich kenne kein Weekend,
Exhibition View Ich kenne kein
Exhibition View Ich kenne kein Weekend,
LENTOS Kunstmuseum Linz, Photo: Reinhard
Weekend, LENTOS
LENTOS Kunstmuseum Linz, Photo: Reinhard
Haider
Kunstmuseum Linz, Photo:
Haider
Reinhard Haider
Exhibition View Ich kenne kein Weekend,
Exhibition View Ich kenne kein
LENTOS Kunstmuseum Linz, Photo: Reinhard
Weekend, LENTOS
Haider
Kunstmuseum Linz, Photo:
Reinhard Haider
Seite 14
Exhibition View Ich kenne kein Weekend,
LENTOS Kunstmuseum Linz, Photo: Reinhard
Haider