Transforming the Art World the History of the Documenta Art Exhibition

"all artworks have a political component - whether it's intended or not."

"I take the attitude of a sociologist or anthropologist. I annotation that certain tribes call something art that other tribes dismiss as bullshit or fifty-fifty denounce equally irreverence."

"...make something which experiences, reacts to it environment, changes, is nonstable..."

"Whatsoever art may be, information technology is not science"

"The world of art is non a globe apart"

"A organization is non imagined; it is objectively present; it is existent"

"Interference in an existing state of affairs which thereby affects information technology - this is something that intrigues me."

"Artists, equally much every bit their supporters and their enemies, no matter of what ideological coloration, are unwitting partners in the art syndrome and chronicle to each other dialectically. They participate jointly in the maintenance and/or evolution of the ideological make-up of their society. They work within that frame, gear up the frame and are being framed."

Summary of Hans Haacke

Hans Haacke largely invented mod 'artivism' as a political strategy for conceptual artists. His work intervenes through the space of the museum or gallery to decry the influence of corporations on club and reveal the hypocrisy of liberal institutions accepting sponsorship from ambitious and conservative capitalists. This work has been immensely pregnant in prefiguring the modern claiming to 'artwashing', the attempted diversion from harmful business practices through philanthropic engagement with the arts.

Haacke'south politics extend to his artistic career, providing a principled example to artists and audiences. He however maintains partial ownership over his artworks after sale, for example, allowing him a measure of control over the extent to which his protestation can be coopted by the art market. As a teacher and author Haacke'south influence is not only in the work he straight produced himself, but in the dissemination of his political strategies through afterward generations of artists. Haacke's fearlessness and refusal to bend in relation to institutional pressure has had an enduring legacy that persists to this day.

Accomplishments

Haacke's work oftentimes shows a lack of respect or reverence towards institutions and convention. His curation pieces, for instance, lay blank the inner workings of a gallery or museum for the public to meet, questioning conventions of behavior towards fine art objects. He highlights simple or everyday materials (water, grass, a potted found) every bit worthy of serious observation, whilst placing historical artifacts on the floor or in rough piles. His piece of work likewise invites participation, request that audiences read, blot and human action on the things information technology reveals. This has contributed to gimmicky conversations about access and political responsibility still going on in museums and galleries today.
Despite his resistance to the financial and corporate structures of the art market place, Haacke'due south work has grown in profile to the betoken where information technology is now recognized and pursued by museums as work that is highly significant in the development of political visual fine art practices. After the censure, deprival and scandal, his piece of work is now invited into institutions rather than kept out.
Haacke 'lives' his politics even through his interactions with the fine art earth - a marketplace-driven international network of uppercase. Past not relying on the sale of artworks to support himself or his family he is able to decide when and how to exhibit and create, and he maintains an unprecedented level of control over the pieces that he does sell to collectors. This provides a model for artists who wish to critique the art world without being wholly subsumed within its inherently backer framework.
Formally, Haacke's piece of work shares characteristics of Land Art and Minimalism only maintains a far sharper political edge than the archetypal examples of those practices. Drawing on highly symbolic processes and materials, his sculptures and installations highlight the same relationships in the gallery space as more than conventional minimalist sculpture, simply also make more than straight allusions to history, politics and the earth in which the sculptures are made. His work offers a challenge to the supposed detachment of minimalism or the monumentalism of Land Fine art, demonstrating to audiences and artists that the same techniques have potential equally tools of direct political critique.

Biography of Hans Haacke

Hans Christoph Carl Haacke was born in Cologne in 1936, during the period of extreme social change that saw the rise of the Nazi Regime in Germany. Past the fourth dimension he was iii years old WWII had begun, and by the historic period of six bombs regularly fell on the street he lived on. In his own words, "I call back walking by a however smoking ruin on my way to school." His father was affiliated with the Social Autonomous party and refused to join the Nazis, costing him his job with the metropolis of Cologne. Such traumatic episodes led the Haacke family to motion from Cologne to a pocket-sized rural town in the southern commune of Bad Godesberg.

Of import Art past Hans Haacke

Progression of Art

1963

Condensation Cube

Condensation Cube is a transparent acrylic box containing a few inches of water. The piece of work was first created in 1963, just has been recreated many times. Although it is tempting to compare Haacke'due south cube with the works by Minimalist artists like Donald Judd or Robert Morris, and with the lightheartedness of group Cipher, Condensation Cube goes beyond this every bit it incorporates the h2o bike, animating the fix-made object. The work changes depending on the temperature in a abiding cycle of evaporation, precipitation and condensation. The artist notes that "the conditions are comparable to a living organism which reacts in a flexible manner to its surroundings. The paradigm of condensation cannot exist precisely predicted. It is irresolute freely, jump just past statistical limits. I like this freedom."

The work represents the rise of interest in biological science, ecology, and cybernetics in the 1960s. Such a seemingly unproblematic piece of work is really rather complex, revealing one of the most fundamental aspects of nature. As noted past architectural historian Mark Jarzombek, "by circumscribed a natural phenomenon within the culturally proscribed infinite of the art gallery or museum, Haacke invites the viewer in as an observer and participant in both natural and cultural phenomena." Another groundbreaking aspect of the work is that it was created at the same time that museums started incorporating moisture engineering. This new applied science, which includes humidifiers, anti-humidifiers and thermohygrometer, affects and is afflicted by the Condensation Cube, questioning the relationship between humans, nature and the establishment past highlighting the lack of attending usually afforded to these natural processes, and the artificiality of the space of the institution, which operates by constraining ideas into preservable and regulated spaces.

Plexiglass and water - Collection of MACBA

1969

Grass Grows

Grass Grows consists of a pile of soil in a cone shape formation sprinkled with grass seeds that sprout throughout the length of the exhibition thank you to the calorie-free that invaded the space from its large windows. Audition members arrive and discover the piece at different moments of its development, challenging the notion of a piece being 'finished' or able to be seen in its entirety. Grass Grows is a piece of work that highlights biological systems, which Haacke describes as "a grouping of elements subject to a mutual plan and purpose that interact so as to go far at a joint goal."

As information technology is constantly changing Grass Grows is a work that occurs independently of its audience. A fiddling occurrence, grass sprouting, becomes almost magical simply every bit a issue of being displaced from the outdoors and moved to an institutional context. Organization theory, the report of the organization of phenomena, besides influenced the artist, who saw it every bit a way to explain life. The organisation which constitutes the artwork here only ceases to exist when life does. Grass Grows is significant as an incorporation of living organisms into a highly conceptual framework, and an early on challenge to the thought of the gallery every bit a place where static objects are on display in a neutral space.

The work was part of the exhibition "Earth Art" at Cornell University's Johnson Museum of Art, curated by Willoughby Sharp, which was decisive in shaping the public perception of Country Fine art equally it included the works of Robert Smithson and Richard Long. Important names of a newer generation of artists such as Gordon Matta-Clark and Louise Lawler were amongst the students that helped installing the show. Haacke was not only working with plants at this time but animals too, a period that he refers to as his 'Franciscan phase' - referring to Saint Francis, known equally the protector of the animals. With time though, Haacke'due south works moved in a different direction shortly after, away from the k landscapes of the other artists included and towards the more than self-independent political gallery pieces that he is best known for.

Soil, seeds, and grass

1971

Shapolsky et al. Manhattan Existent Estate Holdings, A Real Time Social Arrangement, equally of May 1, 1971

Shapolsky et al. Manhattan Real Manor Holdings is a political work comprising of photographs and photocopied documents displaying slumlord Harry Shapolsky's real estate holdings. The work includes over 140 photographs of buildings in Harlem and the Lower Due east Side, aslope text detailing how Shapolsky obscured his ownership through dummy corporations and companies 'owned' past family unit members. The piece culminated in two maps showing the extent of his property empire across New York. Remarkably, the work was entirely based on content open up to the public, with the information collected past the creative person from the public tape.

Formally, Shapolsky et al. Manhattan Real Estate Holdings is innovative and engaging in its presentation of this data. The immensity of its collection of texts, diagrams, and photographs, all equally framed and displayed adjacent resemble works from Joseph Kosuth and Hanne Darboven. At first glance the work is monumental in scale and arrangement but begs close reading of the information displayed. Like Minimalist works that succeed through the relation of the object to the beholder, Haacke invites and provokes a irresolute human relationship between the reader and what is being read. The viewers movement close, step dorsum to take it all in, and crane to read individual lines of text. Haacke used this engagement politically, aiming at an increment in political awareness and attempting to provoke social change. As stated by scholar Rosalyn Deutsche, Haacke challenged "the prevailing dogma that works of art are self-independent entities." In this way, Shapolsky et al. Manhattan Real Estate Holdings blends art with life and social justice. Some critics have argued that Shapolsky et al. Manhattan Existent Estate Holdings is more investigative journalism than art, but this ambiguity is what makes the work unique and noteworthy.

The work led to the cancelation of Haacke's show at the Guggenheim, also as the dismissal of its curator. Fine art globe rumors suggested that Shapolsky was related to 1 of the Guggenheim's lath members, although this was never proved. Regarding the episode, museum manager Thomas Messer wrote in a letter to the artist that the establishment's policies ''exclude active appointment towards social and political ends.'' In a paper interview Messer similarly defended himself by saying: "I'chiliad all for exposing slumlords, but I don't believe the museum is the proper place to practice it." Haacke spent the side by side 12 years without selling or showing his piece of work in American museums.

9 photostats, ane hundred and forty-ii gelatin silvery prints, and one hundred and twoscore-ii photocopies - Collection of the Whitney Museum of American Art

1985

MetroMobiltan

MetroMobiltan explicitly criticizes museums' investment and sponsorship by ethically dubious corporations. It consists of a theatrical copy of the Metropolitan Museum of Art's cornice and banners, meant to resemble the establishment'south façade. The text on the cornice argues for the benefits of sponsoring a museum, while the middle front imprint promotes an exhibition featuring ancient African art. The side banners however disclose Mobil's (a company which sponsored exhibitions at the museum) culpability in the support of the apartheid-era government in Southward Africa. Behind those, a photomural features a funeral for black South African victims. A faux stone slab rests on the floor in front of the banners as an altar or a grave marker. The artist sees his composition as a 3-dimensional collage "put together as a Surrealist'southward exquisite corpse."

Haacke criticizes an institution inside another institution - the piece of work was exhibited at the New Museum likewise in New York. As noted by art critic Hall Foster, this is the "(de)limitation" of such works, revealing how adept the art world is in shamelessly arresting its critics. It is truthful that Haacke reveals a relationship that is ofttimes overlooked by most museum goers, all the same likewise perhaps that his work is not a solution for the problems that it presents. MetroMobiltan is remarkable for explicitly referencing museum's dependence on commercialism, and exposing how corporative interests stand for to the institution'due south stated ethical stance, in an intelligible manner. "Thereby undermining the public's view that cultural institutions are exempt from political and economical concerns," as noted by fine art historian Fred S. Kleiner.

Mixed media installation (printed banners, fiberglass...)

1993

Germania

Haacke's Germania won the top prize at the 1993 Venice Biennale, where Haacke represented Frg. Before inbound the German language pavilion, the viewer faced a photograph of Adolph Hitler. On top of this image, where a swastika was once placed, the artist displayed a replica West German money, suggesting Germany's and then-recent reunification as a capitalist victory. The insertion of the coin also hints at the complex intermingling of art, commerce, and politics. Within, the word Germania, Hitler's proposed new name for Berlin, occupied the back wall. On the floor, thousands of flat pieces of broken marble were piled. "I decided to stand for Germany in both senses of the term: existence the official representative of Germany - the flag bearer, then to speak - and producing a representation of the land. Preparing for this task, I researched the pavilion's history, and, for hours, sat lonely in its nave which had been assigned to me," recollected Haacke when discussing the development of Germania. The installation also references Hitler's visit to Venice and the biennale in 1934, where he became extremely dissatisfied by the appearance of his country's pavilion and by the content of the art, which was modernist and avant-garde. Subsequently that, he refurbished the building, replacing the wood parquet floor with marble.

In his piece of work, Haacke revisits, revisions, and subverts the relation betwixt Hitler and the German pavilion as exemplified by the broken flooring. Haacke'south destructive deed mimics Hitler's cultural destruction. The act of breaking the marble is violent and cathartic, representing a closure with German's shameful past. The creative person also questions the nationalism linked to biennials, which are intended to represent a nation's artistic production in competition with other nations. Past referencing Germany's history Haacke shows that nationalism can be extremely dangerous.

Mixed media installation (cleaved marble, fiberglass mock coin, photography)

1996

Viewing Matters: Upstairs

Viewing Matters: Upstairs is both a curated exhibition and an installation. Haacke juxtaposes works from the Boijmans Van Beuningen Museum drove in order to create new relations between them. In a seemingly iconoclastic act, he mixed works of dissimilar time period, styles and 'relevance.' The artist also exposed the institution'due south backstage past leaving dollies, storage racks and tools on view. Viewing Matters was polemic in nature, and several curators and arts professionals believed that showing the works in such a mundane manner disrespected them and removed their 'aura'.

Haacke's intention was to question the arbitrariness of collections and curatorial decision making. He notes: "It is oft assumed that what we go to encounter on the walls of museums is a disinterested display of the best works, and represents a reliable account of history. This, of course, is never the case. The canon is an agreement by people with cultural power at a certain time." By bringing the basement to the gallery Haacke humanized a infinite that is frequently sterile, transforming the museum in a more democratic space in which art is less intimidating. Viewing Matters: Upstairs asks the spectator to retrieve and to question the collection and institution. As noted past curator Brian Wallis, Haacke succeeds in transforming the passive viewer into 'active reader', an inherently political act.

Installation and storage props (lather, drill, cost box, crates, etc) - Collection of the Boijmans Van Beuningen Museum

2005

Life Goes On

Life Goes On is a deceptively elementary yet remarkably powerful piece of work, consisting of a small potted orange tree with a broken co-operative and a branch which nevertheless bears fruit. The piece of work suggests hope in the potential of its fruit, whilst also symbolizing the fragility of life. Life Goes On was exhibited in Haacke's State of the Wedlock, a testify that focused on recent and distressing political events, such as the war in Republic of iraq and the so-recent Hurricane Katrina, suggesting the continuation of beauty even in low-cal of the so-horrors of prisoner abuse in Abu Gharib and the inaction of the US government in New Orleans. The tree is broken, however however bears fruit even when divided past violence. When placed against the other elements of the exhibition, which included a torn American flag and a printer spitting out news stories, the small-scale tree is a simple reassertion of resilience and regrowth.

The work also serves every bit a reminder of Haacke's involvement in living systems and ecology and an echo of previous piece of work like Grass Grows. While outside the gallery infinite Life Goes On might exist seen as only a establish, within the exhibition context it becomes an ode to life and a meditation on death. This ambiguity gives Life Goes On its main legacy. Haacke comments: "Whether it is an artwork, was an artwork at some betoken, or what status it now has, I can't tell you."

Life Goes On's success in conjuring strong emotions is exemplified by the request of a gallery assistant who asked Haacke whether she could infringe the plant to commemorate a good friend who had recently passed away. The artist generously complied with her wish.

Potted orange 3

2014

The Business concern Backside Fine art Knows the Art of the Koch Brothers

Like his earlier work MetroMobiltan, The Business Backside Art Knows the Art of the Koch Brothers reveals the ethically questionable link between The Metropolitan Museum of Fine art and its patrons. The Business Behind Art Knows the Fine art of the Koch Brothers consists of three photographs, two of the newly built plaza in front of the museum and 1 of a item of the museum façade with a photoshopped banner which reads: "The Business organisation Behind Art Knows the Art of Proficient Business." The sentence comes from MET'southward fundraising department and was once used to convince potential corporate donors to sponsor the establishment. Oversized hundred dollar bills pour from underneath the two outer images as though a continuation of the fountain's water.

The work refers to the scandal which links billionaire David H. Koch and the museum's refurbishment. Koch is a known anti-climatic change businessman, a Republican and a fierce defender of neoliberal capitalism. With his brother he owns the conglomerate Koch Industries, Inc which includes companies that produce asphalt, fertilizer, chemicals, pulp and newspaper. Because of the nature of his business, Koch invests a huge amount of resources in lobbying against laws that protect the environment. The Business Behind Art Knows the Art of the Koch Brothers expressed Haacke's dissatisfaction with the institution's credence of a gift of $65 million dollars, coin which probably comes straight from the environmental destruction of the donors. Sadly, the work shows that Haacke's activism is still urgent and necessary today. Moreover, The Business Behind Art Knows the Art of the Koch Brothers exemplifies what was noted by German art historian Walter Grasskamp: "Haacke did non simply switch to political art, he had to invent information technology in his own terms."

Mixed media (3 framed photographs and printed bills)

Influences and Connections

Influences on Artist

Influenced past Artist

Useful Resources on Hans Haacke

Content compiled and written by Vitoria Hadba Groom

Edited and revised, with Summary and Accomplishments added by Lewis Church

"Hans Haacke Creative person Overview and Analysis". [Internet]. . TheArtStory.org
Content compiled and written by Vitoria Hadba Groom
Edited and revised, with Summary and Accomplishments added past Lewis Church
Available from:
First published on 06 Aug 2018. Updated and modified regularly
[Accessed ]

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Source: https://www.theartstory.org/artist/haacke-hans/