The Taschen Collection: Art of our time
By Marga Paz
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A re-assessment of painting
Those artists who were just launching their careers at the end of the 1970s witnessed the crumbling of the paradigm of modernity that had been in place until then. This rupture constituted a major achievement, which paved the way for the appearance of the art of the 1980s.
For the purposes of these artists who began to gain fame in the 1980s, maintaining the stagnant disciplines of sculpture, photography, drawing and painting was no longer of any use.
It is therefore not surprising that the use of new means of expression in photography, video, performance art and film, along with a toppling of the more traditional painting and sculpture from their pedestals, to a large degree shaped the artistic scene. A new generation of artists managed to question the pre-established aesthetic values on both sides of the Atlantic.
Precisely what these artists were attempting to do by questioning the foundations of modernity that had been taken to their radical extreme by 1970s conceptualism was to prove that the principles of the establishment had been overcome, and as a result that they would forever remain in the past.
One of the most interesting ways of approaching the broad field of possibilities that opened up was the one chosen by Günther Förg, who created a multidisciplinary oeuvre in which he was able to implement a range of artistic disciplines (painting, sculpture, photography and architecture) within his scope, without establishing a hierarchy among them.
At the same time, by transforming the exhibit space into a monumental space by installing his works on walls transformed into monochromatic fields, the unique vernaculars of each of these practices produced resonances and contradictions that repeatedly question the visual codes of these disciplines, while at the same time enriching and breathing new life into them.
The art of Günther Förg thus confronts us with the current reality of architectural constructions in his work, for example, on buildings of the 1920s and 1930s, including the photos of the Casa Malaparte on the coast of Capri (1983), an example of Italian Rationalism; those of the interior of the Fiat building Lingotto in Turin (1986); or those taken at Mies van der Rohe's Haus Lange in Krefeld (1985).
Page [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [13]
Page [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [13]
A re-assessment of painting
Those artists who were just launching their careers at the end of the 1970s witnessed the crumbling of the paradigm of modernity that had been in place until then. This rupture constituted a major achievement, which paved the way for the appearance of the art of the 1980s.
For the purposes of these artists who began to gain fame in the 1980s, maintaining the stagnant disciplines of sculpture, photography, drawing and painting was no longer of any use.
It is therefore not surprising that the use of new means of expression in photography, video, performance art and film, along with a toppling of the more traditional painting and sculpture from their pedestals, to a large degree shaped the artistic scene. A new generation of artists managed to question the pre-established aesthetic values on both sides of the Atlantic.
Precisely what these artists were attempting to do by questioning the foundations of modernity that had been taken to their radical extreme by 1970s conceptualism was to prove that the principles of the establishment had been overcome, and as a result that they would forever remain in the past.
One of the most interesting ways of approaching the broad field of possibilities that opened up was the one chosen by Günther Förg, who created a multidisciplinary oeuvre in which he was able to implement a range of artistic disciplines (painting, sculpture, photography and architecture) within his scope, without establishing a hierarchy among them.
At the same time, by transforming the exhibit space into a monumental space by installing his works on walls transformed into monochromatic fields, the unique vernaculars of each of these practices produced resonances and contradictions that repeatedly question the visual codes of these disciplines, while at the same time enriching and breathing new life into them.
The art of Günther Förg thus confronts us with the current reality of architectural constructions in his work, for example, on buildings of the 1920s and 1930s, including the photos of the Casa Malaparte on the coast of Capri (1983), an example of Italian Rationalism; those of the interior of the Fiat building Lingotto in Turin (1986); or those taken at Mies van der Rohe's Haus Lange in Krefeld (1985).
Page [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [13]
Taschen Collection
Hardcover 11.7 x 16.5 in., 254 pages
$ 70.00
$ 70.00
The art of a particular moment in history from a new point of view
TASCHEN publishing house, design department, with Thomas Struth's Paradise 9, 1999. Foto: Taschen, Eric Laignel, 2001