Archive for September 2017

Dear friends,

Documenta is held every 5 years, we had been once before, five years ago, and were very impressed.

One of our favorite pieces at Documenta. There were 2 of these wrapped towers, across the street from each other.

Check Point Sekondi Loco, 1901-2030 by Ibraham Mahama of Tamale, Ghana, 2016-17

Charcoal sacks, scrap metal, tarpaulins, metal tags, and leather from Henschel train interior

A great picture from Documenta's web site showing the jute sacks being assembled, all 1729 square meters of them.

http://www.documenta14.de/en/artists/13704/ibrahim-mahama

Lines to get into the Palais Bellevue. The Neue Galerie is directly behind. The last time we were at Documenta there were no lines anywhere. This year’s (or this quinquennial’s) is much more heavily attended, but perhaps that is because we are here on the last weekend before closing.

Guillermo Galindo pieces created with the artist at Magnolia Editions on castoff and donated refugee possessions. These are refugees entering Greece.

They seemed to be sort of jumping the gun here, taking down Marta Minujin’s Parthenon of Books before Documenta was over. It turned out the books, wrapped in plastic, were being given away to those interested. We saw a long line of people waiting for one.

This is a photo from the web

Incredible carved marble tent

Biinjiya’iing Onji (From inside, 2017) by Rebecca Belmore, Canada
Marble
140 × 200 × 200 cm
Fabricated by the studio of Vangelis Ilias
Work travels to Kassel after the exhibition in Athens closes on July 16

This is a photo of a photo of how this piece looked installed in Greece.

Girls just want to have fun.

The Fridericianum Gallery (below)

In the lobby of the Fridericianum, an animated projection.

A flasher.

A large exhibit by Lucas Samaras; one of many assemblages.

Borrowing Lucas Samaras' piece for a selfie.

A cool piece which Daniel our AirBnB host in Kassel told us about, done in 1994. The artist, Janine Antoni, slept while an EEG recorded her brain waves and her dreams. Then during the day, she wove the EEG readings, which she later slept under at night.

Janine Antoni
(b. 1964, Freeport, Bahamas)

Slumber (1994)
Maple loom, wool yarn, bed, EEG machine, artist’s REM reading on computer paper, seven nightgowns woven into a 126-feet blanket
Dimensions variable
National Museum of Contemporary Art, Athens (EMST), donated by the Dakis Joannou Collection in 2014
Fridericianum, Kassel

Ms. Antoni turns out to be the same artist who created the pee funnel gargoyle which I loved some years back and was featured in an earlier NY blog.

Moving on from Fridericianum to Documenta Halle

Mask within a mask (Inuit, I believe)

Don in front of Guillermo Galindo’s boat instruments/sculptures

A page from the magazine Art Speziale, Documenta 14, showing Guillermo in a performance.

Another look at the wrapped towers

Pano of the Kassel skyline

Roger Bernat's the Oath Stone

Roger Bernat‘s 110-pound, plastic and fiberglass replica of an ancient Greek monolith known as the oath stone, upon which council members once swore their vows.

Okay. I had to try it.

Showing off my great strength. It turns out that this slab of faux rock was the star of a video. It was kidnapped by an LFBTQ group of art protestors and refugees in Athens, taken to different locations on its way from Athens to Kassel, and where it had different adventures; somewhat like the traveling garden troll. At least, this is what I was told by the strong man in the first photograph who seemed to be knowledgeable on the subject.

I think I did strain some muscles in my right arm, but nothing serious.

Here’s a link to an article with a slightly different version: https://hyperallergic.com/382407/lgbtq-refugee-rights-group-steals-artwork-from-documenta-in-athens/

Walking in the park near our apartment.

Urban gardens on the walk back. These are not humble dwellings, but seem to be elaborate garden sheds.

I wonder why I did not take some photos of the apartment, as it was absolutely charming in an old building which had been refurbished.

This is the only photo I have, one of the walls of the bedroom. Daniel, the owner of the apartment, works at one of the museums in Kassel, and was taking off to Southern France for 3 weeks.

The next day Kassel was almost empty of art lovers and tourists. Really, I don’t know how they moved them out so fast. Nothing left to do, but start breaking it all down and scraping the “Documenta” signs off the floor.

As for us, we are off to Berlin.

xoxo

Era and Don

Hello all,

We've somewhat avoided Germany in the past (for political and historic reasons), but now we felt that maybe Germany and the post-war generations had something to teach us. We truly admire how they have faced up to their responsibilities for the horrors of the past; something many countries have yet to do, our own country comes to mind, Japan, China, Turkey, etc., ad nauseam. Also, this year both Documenta (every 5 years) and Muenster Sculpture Project (every 10 years) were happening.

It was pure pleasure to take things very easy in Hamburg. We didn't try to push through any jet lag, we had no appointments to make, no deadlines, nobody counting on us for anything, except the occasional email question. We walked everywhere, as we have done since we've been in Germany. Our favorite exercise, walking in a new environment.

Hamburg is a city of many waterways. This was around the corner from our very comfortable and well-located AirBnB apartment in Hamburg.

We stayed in a great apartment near one of the older parts of the city, the harbor area, built in the 1880s. It's not very old (for a European city). Hamburg suffered terrible bombing during WW2 so had to be rebuilt. I read that almost 50% of the harbor area or Hafencity survived, which is a greater survival rate than Hamburg in general. This harbor area is filled with beautiful brick buildings and warehouses which have now been declared a UNESCO World Heritage site.

Detail of above; the ship statuettes acknowledge from where their finances flow.

This steeple served as our landmark, visible from almost any part of the city and also close to our apartment.

Some of the beautiful brick buildings, down the street from us.

Chilehaus, a crazy mammoth brick structure.

It makes some unexpected undulations and oblique angles.

Its next-door neighbor, Sprinkenhof

And across the street, a great chocolate store, Chocoversum.

Best crepes we have ever had in our life at Ti Breizh - Haus der Bretagne. We liked it so much, we went back again,

so 2 out of 3 dinners

Walking around the Harbor District, Hafencity

The warehouses are still in use.

A trip to the very decent Kunsthalle Hamburg

Portrait of Egon Erwin Kisch by Christian Schad 1928

What was billed as a light show translated to ships and harbor lit up in blue.

Hamburg Hauptbahnhof (Hbf), one of many impressive German train stations - at least we were impressed until we saw the Berlin Hbf

This fellow and another neighbor on the train saved our asses by translating the German announcement for us. Because of high winds, trees had been uprooted and blown onto the tracks. Therefore the train had to be diverted, and a 2 hour direct trip became a 5 hour trip with a transfer to get to Muenster. Another example of extreme weather on our precious planet.

Selfie, Don Farnsworth-style.

We arrived in Muenster, again staying at an AirBnB. The host, a personable young man, Dominick, normally rents out his entire apartment as he is often away on projects in India and Saudi Arabia. However, during the time we rented from him, he happened to be in town, so we had an unexpected roommate. He was extremely considerate, fortunately.

Drizzling on and off; walking in a very green Muenster. Muenster Sculpture Project reminded me of an art puzzle treasure hunt, not unlike Naoshima, the art island in Japan - although maybe not as scenic - where the prizes are not necessarily very well-marked, and when you stumble upon them, you consider yourself lucky.

The Muenster Sculpture Project takes place once every 10 years.

Nicole Eisenman’s sculpture and fountain

Central Muenster, the old city

The LWL Museum; the truck is an installation

Claes Oldenburg’s Billiard Balls from a previous Sculpture Project. Most of the older sculptures were unfortunately graffiti’ed and not very skillfully or imaginatively graffito'ed.

Ilya Kabokov; if you look closely you might make out the poem written in wire (and in German).

Donald Judd’s sculpture from an earlier Sculpture Project (graffiti’ed)

Standing atop Judd’s sculpture

Evidence of yesterday’s high winds.

Schnitzel, Westphalian style. Mass quantities were consumed, as the Coneheads used to say. Beer was also imbibed.

A piece by Adam Bartholl, recharging a cell phone over a campfire.

We will show you another Bartholl sculpture later which we thought was pretty cool. We didn't stick around long enough to see if this one worked.

A very ambitious project by Pierre Huyghe, an excavation in an old ice rink, which he called After ALife Ahead (no typo). We thought he did a masterful job of creating a realistic landscape, which seemed to mimic the way this landscape might actually form.

Bees had made hives in these clay mounds.

This is another of Aram Bartholl’s projects, which we loved. LED chandeliers powered by candle power. So cool. We tried to purchase one, but no luck.

Men and Women’s public toilets by artist Hans-Peter Feldmann. In a country where, similar to the USA, and perhaps even a little worse than the US, public toilets are few and far between, and rather expensive when you do find them, this artist has made his toilets clean, lovely and free. We applaud him.