Harald Szeemann Dies at Seventy-One; Protesting Sexism at the Pompidou; France's New Contemporary Art Chief
HARALD SZEEMANN DIES AT SEVENTY-ONE
Legendary curator Harald Szeemann died last Friday night at age seventy-one. As the Neue Zürcher Zeitung reports, Szeemann, who suffered from a pulmonary illness, died in the southern Swiss canton Ticino. The announcement was made by Davide Croff, president of the Venice Biennale, which Szeemann curated in 1999 and 2001. "It's a great loss for the art world, which will miss Harald Szeemann's forward-looking organizational and critical skills," said Croff.
The Süddeutsche Zeitung offers a portrait of Szeemann, who was born on June 11, 1933 in Bern, where he ran the Kunsthalle from 1961 to 1969. In addition to curating the exhibitions “Kinetic Art,” 1965, and “Science-Fiction,” 1967, Szeemann invited Christo to wrap the Kunsthalle in 1968. After heavy criticism of his influential 1969 exhibition “When Attitudes Become Form,” Szeemann quit the Kunsthalle to become a freelance curator.
As the director of Documenta 5 in 1972, Szeemann “guaranteed a place for himself in the Olympia of art historians in the eyes of art critics,” according to the Süddeutsche Zeitung. “Documenta 5 lifted the barriers between high culture and low culture and opened the museum gates to advertisements, kitsch, toys. Happenings or experimental films appeared in place of neatly hung paintings.” The paper singles out three exceptional exhibitions that Szeemann curated after Documenta: “Junggesellenmaschinen” (Machines for Singles), 1975, which considered sadomasochistic currents in the writings and works of Deleuze, Kafka, Freud, and Duchamp; “Monte Verità,” 1979, about the artists’ colony in Ticino’s Lago Maggiore; and “Der Hang zum Gesamtkunstwerk” (The Inclination towards the Total Work of Art), 1983. The ‘80s and ‘90s saw solo exhibitions dedicated to artists including Delacroix, Immendorff, Polke, Merz, Baselitz, Serra, and Beuys. The city of Kassel, which hosts Documenta, recently honored Szeemann for his life’s work with a prize that the curator was due to accept this fall.
The Neue Zürcher Zeitung also reports on Szeemann’s last major project, at the 2002 Swiss national exhibition “Expo.02.” “He designed a pavilion covered with a thin layer of gold leaf, which had to be protected by security guards to stop visitors from walking off with the precious metal,” notes the newspaper. “Inside the pavilion . . . the main attraction was a machine that destroyed two (old) one-hundred-franc banknotes every minute during the 159 days of the exhibition.”
PROTESTING SEXISM AT THE POMPIDOU
The Centre Georges Pompidou's current exhibition "Dionysiac," which features only male artists, has been the target of a protest. A statement signed by the collective Artpies was distributed at the opening last Tuesday night and has been circulated since then on blogs and flyers. "Finally, the Pompidou has opened up to male art!" the statement begins, in an ironic tone that continues through the entire declaration. "Since its inauguration in 1977, only 86% of the artists in the collections of the Musée national d'Art Moderne are men. Within these collections, only 93% of the artworks were made by male artists. We note with relief that 'Dionysiac' has finally passed the barrier of 100% pure male." While linking the all-male show to the policies of the conservative politician Nicolas Sarkozy, Artpies goes on to congratulate the show's curator Christine Macel for "revolutionary" zeal in her "engagement in the fight against sexism."
FRANCE'S NEW CONTEMPORARY ART CHIEF
Libération’s Henri-François Debailleux interviews Olivier Kaeppelin, newly appointed head of France’s Délégation aux arts plastiques (DAP), a branch of the Ministry of Culture dedicated to promoting contemporary art. Kaeppelin wants to make the DAP into a resource for artists and art lovers, and to attain that objective, he intends to initiate more public art projects and improve the visibility of French contemporary art both by French nationals and by foreign artists living in France.
Kaeppelin has a complex approach to the growing role of private galleries and art spaces. “When Charles Saatchi popularized the Young British Artists, he managed to promote artists who were not known. I have nothing against this kind of initiative. I will try to put mechanisms in place that will allow us to benefit from the knowledge of collectors, so that private opinions can be given as much weight as the ideas of our public institutions. We need this kind of enrichment. I was delighted when I saw that the association led by Eric Corne succeeded in creating the contemporary art center Le Plateau. La Maison Rouge, the foundation created by collector Antoine de Galbert, is a great space, and I hope that the Pinault Foundation, also a private initiative, will establish itself quickly.”
Kaeppelin seems to have some plans for the contemporary art institute Palais de Tokyo, whose board recently began its search for new directors to replace Nicolas Bourriaud and Jérôme Sans, both of whom are planning to leave this year. “I hope that the Palais de Tokyo will become the great cultural place that it must be,” Kaeppelin told the newspaper. He may be referring to expansion plans proposed by DAP official Bernard Blistène last spring. It was rumored at the time that then-Culture Minister Jean-Jacques Aillagon wanted Blistène to become the institute’s next director, a plan that was perceived by some as an attempt by Aillagon to “take over” the Palais. But because the Palais is not technically a national museum, the Ministry of Culture has no official role in choosing its director; rather, the institute’s board makes the decision. But, judging from Kaeppelin’s statement, the ministry may still try to put through Blistène’s proposed expansion.