10 March to 12 May 2019

Water tower of the Kunsthalle

Opening on Friday, 09 March 2019 at 19 hrs

In 1970 the artist Harry Kramer (born 1925 in Lingen, died 1997 in Kassel) was appointed professor at the Kassel University of Fine Arts. Even sceptical about the question of whether art could be taught, he decided to give up his own production and to make and exhibit art together with his students in the future. On the other hand, the artist Kramer did not disappear completely in the educational province, but only shifted authorship from the previously sole to that of the collective under the name Atelier Kramer. “The renunciation of the signature is not due to a refusal of art, but to a refusal of the signature. In terms of content, the actions were jointly conceived and carried out.

The premise was that art was always radical, and the actions were carried out according to this premise,
existential traits. The gradual appropriation of all art production by the market on the one hand and a society tending towards conservatism on the other was reflected. In 1971, for example, Harry Kramer spent ten days bricking himself in at the Museum Fridericianum in Kassel, communicating only through bars with visitors.
The installation reacted even more extremely to the phenomenon of the surveillance state.
“1984 – Termite State.” The concept: “In collaboration of artists, psychologists
and physicians, parts of a termite structure are transformed to human dimensions.
and inhabited by test subjects during an exhibition. This last major project
of the Atelier Kramer from 1978 was realized, but unfortunately it was not
publicly exhibited.

Documents and photographs from the time of Atelier Kramer are presented.

Curator of the exhibition is Heiner Schepers, former director of the Kunsthalle Lingen.

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator