Fountain of Youth
Leipzig 14 Jan – 1 Apr 2017
Group Show by:
Hans Aichinger / Mary Bauermeister / Lars Bjerre / Manuele Cerutti / Philipp Fürhofer /
Steffen Junghans / Falk Messerschmidt / Philipp Modersohn / Sebastian Neeb / Nik Nowak / Sebastian Schrader / Thomas Sommer / Wanda Stolle / Elisa Strozyk / Marie von Heyl
2017 is the 100th anniversary of Marcel Duchamp's coup, a piece of sanitary ware presented as a work of art under the pseudonym »R.Mutt« for the "Big Show" of the Independent Artist Society in New York. The scandal surrounding the rejection of the object by the organizing committee has become known and discussed as "Richard Mutt Case." This coup, launched by Duchamp with the help of his friends can be described as an early example of conceptual art.
Mary Bauermeister (born in 1934 in Frankfurt am Main) is one of the defining figures of the avant-garde scene of the early 1960s. After her first major solo exhibition at the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam in 1962, she left for New York together with Karlheinz Stockhausen, inspired by Robert Rauschenberg and Jasper Johns. Mary Bauermeister settled there quickly, and the most prestigious museums, including the MoMA, the Guggenheim, the Whitney in New York and the Hirshhorn Museum in Washington bought Bauermeister's work. Marcel Duchamp was fascinated by the works of Bauermeister and her conceptual thinking manifesting within the ready trouvé, which combines the beauty of a natural material with the ideas of Dada and Fluxus in her works.
The exhibition "Fountain of Youth" examines the extent to which Duchamp's concept of art has acted upon the thinking and works of emerging artists. Following this idea, all of the involved artists are invited to present a piece of their work, from their original oeuvre -alongside a personal ready made, objet trouvé or found footage.
In the middle of the room, the selected objects of the 13 artists are gathered together. Included among other things are a pair of trousers, a LED candle, a toy gun, a chicken carton, a glass shoe and a loudspeaker membrane. On the plinth the mass of objects have become something more than just a means of presentation - they are now liberated from a "natural" context with an abstract claim to be and say something different. The correspondence with the surrounding artworks of various genres is also ambivalent. Similarities and overlapping are possible as well as desired, while transitional states provoke questions about the attribution and the value of all the assembled exhibits. As 'assisted readymades,' such as combined everyday objects, and 'imitated rectified readymades,' such as reproduced and modified objects, as 'semi-readymades' and other hybrids, all objects are categorizable and proportionate.
The concept of art has expanded in the last century and has become more permeable. The famous question - Is it art? - has become less scandalous, with an increased need for entertainment on the one hand and a forced claim to an intellectual presentation on the other.
The aftermath of the beginnings of conceptual art, of Dada and Fluxus, are alive, they have offered a more liberal point of view. The suspicion for a thing or found object on a plinth seems less, as the willingness to recognize an idea and concept has grown. The viewer increasingly becomes co-producer of the work's genesis. The group exhibition shows an interesting cross section of contemporary artistic positions of various genres. What combines the participants is their willingness to supply an object for this topical occasion and anniversary, re-examining the question of art in the sense of Duchamp under modern conditions.
»Fountain of Youth« invites to test the status quo of the concept of art.
Hans Aichinger / Mary Bauermeister / Lars Bjerre / Manuele Cerutti / Philipp Fürhofer /
Steffen Junghans / Falk Messerschmidt / Philipp Modersohn / Sebastian Neeb / Nik Nowak / Sebastian Schrader / Thomas Sommer / Wanda Stolle / Elisa Strozyk / Marie von Heyl
2017 is the 100th anniversary of Marcel Duchamp's coup, a piece of sanitary ware presented as a work of art under the pseudonym »R.Mutt« for the "Big Show" of the Independent Artist Society in New York. The scandal surrounding the rejection of the object by the organizing committee has become known and discussed as "Richard Mutt Case." This coup, launched by Duchamp with the help of his friends can be described as an early example of conceptual art.
Mary Bauermeister (born in 1934 in Frankfurt am Main) is one of the defining figures of the avant-garde scene of the early 1960s. After her first major solo exhibition at the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam in 1962, she left for New York together with Karlheinz Stockhausen, inspired by Robert Rauschenberg and Jasper Johns. Mary Bauermeister settled there quickly, and the most prestigious museums, including the MoMA, the Guggenheim, the Whitney in New York and the Hirshhorn Museum in Washington bought Bauermeister's work. Marcel Duchamp was fascinated by the works of Bauermeister and her conceptual thinking manifesting within the ready trouvé, which combines the beauty of a natural material with the ideas of Dada and Fluxus in her works.
The exhibition "Fountain of Youth" examines the extent to which Duchamp's concept of art has acted upon the thinking and works of emerging artists. Following this idea, all of the involved artists are invited to present a piece of their work, from their original oeuvre -alongside a personal ready made, objet trouvé or found footage.
In the middle of the room, the selected objects of the 13 artists are gathered together. Included among other things are a pair of trousers, a LED candle, a toy gun, a chicken carton, a glass shoe and a loudspeaker membrane. On the plinth the mass of objects have become something more than just a means of presentation - they are now liberated from a "natural" context with an abstract claim to be and say something different. The correspondence with the surrounding artworks of various genres is also ambivalent. Similarities and overlapping are possible as well as desired, while transitional states provoke questions about the attribution and the value of all the assembled exhibits. As 'assisted readymades,' such as combined everyday objects, and 'imitated rectified readymades,' such as reproduced and modified objects, as 'semi-readymades' and other hybrids, all objects are categorizable and proportionate.
The concept of art has expanded in the last century and has become more permeable. The famous question - Is it art? - has become less scandalous, with an increased need for entertainment on the one hand and a forced claim to an intellectual presentation on the other.
The aftermath of the beginnings of conceptual art, of Dada and Fluxus, are alive, they have offered a more liberal point of view. The suspicion for a thing or found object on a plinth seems less, as the willingness to recognize an idea and concept has grown. The viewer increasingly becomes co-producer of the work's genesis. The group exhibition shows an interesting cross section of contemporary artistic positions of various genres. What combines the participants is their willingness to supply an object for this topical occasion and anniversary, re-examining the question of art in the sense of Duchamp under modern conditions.
»Fountain of Youth« invites to test the status quo of the concept of art.