I felt a connection with this week’s visiting artist, Johanna Love. She remediates photographs and videos of car journeys.
I often make videos of car journeys, recreating those of my childhood when I sat in the back seat watching the passing landscape. My latest one was In A Flash.
The year before last, on the taxi ride from the airport to the centre of Vienna, the flat landscape gradually gave way to a looming mass of industrial buildings belching gases into the atmosphere: the scene took my breath away – it felt so out of place, intimidating, shocking. The area is called Schwechat, and is home to one of Europe’s largest inland refineries owned by OMV. In Spring last year it began producing green hydrogen, currently at a rate of up to 1,500 metric tonnes per year making an annual saving in CO2 emissions of 15,000 metric tonnes. I was back in Vienna a couple of months ago and I managed to video it from the City Airport Train.
I applied a neon filter to the first section to reflect my initial reaction of disbelief, slowly moving through monotone to reality. I particularly like the moments of transition, the overlay and monotone effect on the trees and the chimney stacks. Screenshots reveal moments when the image is neither one thing or another; moments of transience and liminality.
I’m intrigued by those moments. They inherently represent change, the process and becoming: they are what was once, what is now and what is to become. Becoming is fundamentally a state of liminality.
It’s taken me a while to finish this post – other things have got in the way – but I needed to complete it to make note of what I saw, and what I thought.
Whilst in Vienna, we also managed to visit the Secession Building, which was designed by the architect, Joseph Maria Olbrich, in 1898, as an exhibition space for the Secession. He was one of the founding members along with a group of artists, including Klimt, who had broken away from the traditional Künstlerhaus to pursue progressive contemporary art. The group’s motto which appears above the door is “To every age its art, to every art its freedom.” Topped by a golden cabbage comprised of 2,500 gilded iron laurel leaves, it houses Klimt’s Beethoven Frieze.
The frieze is based on Wagner’s interpretation of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony: it is a tale of humankind’s search for happiness.
The kneeling couple symbolize suffering humanity and beg the knight for helpIn this scene humanity faces of Typhoeus, a hybrid monster with a snakelike body and blue wings.To his left are his daughters, the Gorgons and above them masklike representations of Sickness, Madness and Death.To his right are Lasciviousness, Wantoness and the large-bellied IntemperanceGnawing GriefHumanity’s search for happiness is found in poetry – a female figure playing a lyreFigures representing the arts lead to the ideal realm of artThe deification of art is a couple kissing in front of of a choir of angels – “This kiss to the whole world” (Ode to Joy)
I didn’t know what I was expecting really, which is a bit daft considering that I had seen pictures of it in books. I initially felt, yeah ok, but now reflecting on it I think I must have been suffering from a case of art gallery overload. It was really remarkable. It’s been relocated from its original position. It’s high up on the walls of the room, and surrounds you. The fact that you have to look up, makes viewing it an almost reverential experience. That coupled with the fact that you can listen to Beethoven whilst you admire it.
In addition to Klimt and Schiele, I saw many works by other artists, which I felt might be useful over the next year or so, some of whom I hadn’t previously come across.
This bronze sculpture is Tower of Mothers, 1937/38 by Käthe Kollwitz. It shows a group of mothers standing together and forming a circle to protect their children, who can be seen peering out from between their skirts. The strength and determination to defend whatever the cost is beautifully captured in the postures of the figures, particularly the mother with her arms spread wide. There is no fear in this sculpture. The mothers are protecting their children from war and the horrors of war, which is poignant as Kollwitz herself lost one of her sons in the First World War, a loss she never recovered from.
Lovers, 1914Venus in the Grotto , 1914
These oil paintings on canvas are by Koloman Moser. Moser was a founding member of the Secession, and was primarily a graphic designer and illustrator, as well as a set designer, furniture and textile designer, and painter. I like the slight graphic quality of these paintings as well as the unusual palette – his use of what looks like a lime green gives a sickly feel to the works, and works really well with the purplish reds in the skin tones and the shroud. They appear almost luminous.
The ceramic glazed sculpture above is Insinuation, 1902/03, by Richard Lucksch. I had to resist the urge to touch it. I found myself wondering what the young men are whispering in her ears; what are they insinuating? The very title implies something negative. It reminded me how difficult it can be to navigate a true course through life, when others are constantly whispering things into one’s ears, insinuating, commenting, doubting, demoralising, chipping away.
I felt drawn to this painting, for some reason. There’s some gold; that’s a start. The skin is beautifully rendered and I like the composition: I start from the head encased in the golden square and make my way down her body with the interesting detour created by her right arm, along her legs, through her toes up towards the top right and then back to the golden square via the light coloured rectangle. It’s satisfyingly complete.
It’s Seated Woman (Marietta), 1907 by Broncia Koller-Pinells, the Austrian equivalent of radical, Laura Knight, who also challenged the taboo for women artists at the time – the nude.
Head of A Dancer, 1923, by Erika Klien is an example of Viennese Kineticism, which was inspired by Cubism, Constructivism, Futurism, dance, music and architecture. I like the sense of movement of the head and the hands, which have also been deconstructed in parts, as well as the quite limited colour palette.
What’s not to like about a Degas figure? This one Pregnant Woman, was risqué for its time, depicting a woman in a pregnant state, and was cast in bronze after his death.
This definitely gets the award for most interesting. The Doll is from the film, My Alma – Oskar Kokoschkas’ Love to a Doll. I’ve since researched it a bit further and it really is a strange tale. Alma was Alma Mahler, Gustav Mahler’s widow. Having had her first kiss from Klimt when she was 17, she went on to have many love affairs before , during and after her several marriages. One of those affairs was with the young artist, Oskar Kokoschka for whom she became the love of his life. I think it’s fair to say he was obsessed with her. He had to go off and fight in the First World War War and whilst he was away she married a previous lover. Needless to say he was quite devastated when he returned home, after having been bayoneted in the chest, suffered a major brain injury and declared mentally unstable, to find that she had ended their relationship. So he did what all spurned lovers do, he commissioned a doll maker to make a life size doll of her providing very specific instructions as to how it should be made and what it should feel like to the touch. When she finally arrived he was a bit perturbed by the fact that her body had been covered in feathers but went on to pose her for paintings and photographs, dress her up and even take her to the opera. But eventually he resolved himself to the fact that his Alma doll wasn’t doing it for him, so he threw a party, then took her out into the garden where he chopped off her head and broke a bottle of red wine over her. I’m not sure that I’ll watch the film…
I have just returned from an amazing 4 nights in magically festive Vienna, having had my fill of glühwein, Sachertorte and boiled beef broth (it loses something in translation!).
I’ve never been before, but will definitely be going back. Beautiful architecture, and so much to do, not least the seemingly endless supply of museums and galleries.
The Leopold and Belvedere were on my hit list as housing the greatest number of works by Klimt and Schiele. I had a nagging fear that the episode might end the same way as Michael Craig-Martin but, instead, I came away with a greater appreciation of all the details that can’t be gleaned from a photograph: the brushstrokes, the surprising thickness and coverage of the paint, sometimes leaving areas of the canvas exposed and the purity of colour. It was a revelation to get up really close and just look.
Death and Life 1910/15 , Klimt
Detail
I had always thought that Klimt applied paint quite uniformly and flat, so I was surprised to see the thickness of the paint and multi-directional brushstrokes. I like the way Klimt paints skin in all its imperfections and blotchiness, ranging from the pale and cold whiteness to the warmer, darker tones of the male figure.
Seeing ‘The Kiss’ was an interesting experience; it reminded me of when I saw the ‘Mona Lisa’ in the Louvre. Being one of Klimt’s most famous works, along with the ‘Mona Lisa’ and Van Gogh’s ‘Starry, Starry Night’, it is one of the most mass reproduced images of all time. I was underwhelmed, and I found it quite sad, as I was expecting to be bowled over by it. It was the most crowded room at the Belvedere, but what I found particularly interesting was that the crowd of people in front of it, holding up their phones and cameras, seemed totally uninterested in looking at it in any great detail – in fact they had left a sizeable gap in front of it so that they could get it in shot. This was handy as it allowed me to perform a flanking manoeuvre to get in front of it, to try and appreciate it as a work of art, as opposed to just a selfie opportunity with a celebrity. There was no point taking a photo – it was so strongly lit, and the lights reflected in the glass covering it. I grappled with my feeling of ‘numbness’ for the rest of the day, and as I was mulling it over in my mind, holding yet another mug of mulled wine in my hand, the answer came to me when I remembered John Berger’s ‘Ways of Seeing’ in which he considers the effect of reproduction:
”When the camera reproduces a painting, it destroys the uniqueness of its image. As a result its meaning changes. Or, more exactly, its meaning multiplies and fragments into many meanings … Alternatively one can forget about the quality of the reproduction and simply be reminded, when one sees the original, that it is a famous painting of which somewhere one has already seen a reproduction. But in either case the uniqueness of the original now lies in it being the original of a reproduction. It is no longer what its image shows that strikes one as unique; its first meaning is no longer to be found in what it says, but in what it is.”
By contrast, in the next room was one of my favourites, ‘Judith and the Head of Holofernes’, a depiction of a strong femme fatale, the polar opposite to ‘The Kiss’.
Judith and the Head of Holofernes, Klimt, 1901
What can I say? I love gold leaf: I’m a magpie. Despite the abundance of gold in the painting, the eye is still drawn to the figure of Judith which is thrown forward by the decorative background. She is holding the head of Holofernes, somewhat gently, which is shown half in and half out of the frame, relegating him to a secondary role in the drama which has unfolded. There are intriguingly two decapitated heads in the painting; the treatment of the choker has effectively severed Judith’s head from her body. It is an image full of female power, sexual and otherwise.
It’s easy to forget that Klimt was a master draughtsman.
His drawings are exquisite. The simple monochrome of pencil or black chalk, a quiet antidote to the noise of gold and vibrant colour.
Self-Portrait with Raised bare Shoulder, Egon Schiele, 1912
I love this self-portrait; it is so expressive, and the fluidity of the brushstrokes creates a sense of movement and vitality. It is reminiscent of the Lucian Freud self-portrait in my earlier post, “I’m Sorry, Michael…”. It is quite small but he manages to pack a lot into such a confined space, including his shoulder, which by extension includes his body. The difference in treatment between the figure itself, which is quite thinly painted, and the more heavy impasto in the background is extremely effective. It is painted on wood, which might explain the wonderful textures on the face which would have been caused by the hog bristles in the brushes, although I have read, in a book on artists’ palettes, that Schiele would often use a brush to remove paint from a canvas in order to create texture. I particularly like the simple use of sgrafitto particularly above his left eye, and to delineate the edge of the chin against the neck.
The description next to this piece was interesting in that it described Schiele’s connection with his own body as both a fusion and a dissociation, in the context of the main theme of Viennese Modernism ie the individual becomes a dividual – something that can be divided.
The Embrace, 1917, Egon Schiele
This painting is so impactful. It’s approximately 1.5m by 1m. It shows Schiele with his wife, Edith Harms, in a loving and tender embrace. Unlike a lot of his work, this does not, to me at least, have any sexual or erotic overtones. There is a sense of completeness, in that Schiele depicts himself physically emaciated as he envelops and buries his head in the hair of his wife, almost blending into one, in an act of nourishing love. It’s even more poignant to think that this is one of his last works, as they both died within days of each other a few years later in the flu epidemic of 1918-20. He was only 28.
Both Schiele and Klimt were ahead of their time; they were disruptors. Schiele was akin to Sid Vicious and the punk movement, and Klimt founded the Viennese Secession, breaking away from the constraints of the Künstlerhaus. In today’s art world there is no prescribed way of doing things, no longer any art movements or – isms against which to rebel; artists have never been freer to express themselves in whatever way they wish, so I wonder how it is possible for an artist to stand out; how to make a difference in a world of differences.
I’m starting to feel excited about a trip I’ve booked to Vienna in December. I’m planning to binge on Schiele and Klimt, as well as Sachertorte (if I can find one that is definitely nut free)!
I love Klimt, in particular the way in which his figures disappear into, or emerge out of, his highly patterned and decorative backgrounds.
Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I, 1907
I’ve only recently discovered a Berlin collage artist, Kathrin Kuhn, who produced a series called Housewives.
” The Housewives project began as an experiment. In the Natural Science Museum I started thinking about animals tricks to make themselves invisible, a camouflage strategy called somatolysis. Butterflies for example use confusing patterns to melt into their environment to disappear from enemies eyes.
I started to apply that effect to my images, melting peoples clothes with the wallpaper patterns, mixing them up in the most bewildering way. I called the project Housewives because I found it a good metaphor for the way women were living in the past decades as housewives; being one with their homes, being connected with their domestic tasks so closely that it becomes an identity, even having a decorative function. The women in the pictures could use their patterns to disappear in their established setting, or leave it, to stand out in the most striking way in another environment.”
Housewives VII, Kathrin Kuhn
Am I a part of my background, or is it part of me?
Kate McCalmont-Woods 