Pop, Irony and Seriousness
Albert Oehlen in conversation with Thomas Groetz about Martin Kippenberger
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TG: On the picture Plusquamperfekt - gehabt haben we see a house made of brawn. It looks like a Kiecol sculpture. Is that an allusion?
AO: It's certainly an allusion to Kiecol. He liked Kiecol very much, and found him pretty good. But I'm not so sure he liked brawn. That wouldn't fit. The arrangement of the hard-boiled eggs with the slice of cucumber lends the object a lofty phallic aspect.
TG: What does the title mean in association with what is depicted?
AO: It's a mystery to me.
TG: Can you remember anything about the origin of these eight collages that you and Martin Kippenberger jointly put together in 1984? They crop up in the booklet that Kippenberger made for your 30th birthday.
AO: At the time we were living in Vienna in a studio that Peter Pakesch had found for us. We had a joint stock of pictorial material on a large table, and we started on a collage individually and together. Mostly, he stood a bit closer to the Hustler issues and the spray where the latex sausages emerge.
TG: A little known but very impressive Kippenberger work is this alleged triptych dating from 1983, which you already mentioned. The astonishing thing here is that the satirical elements exaggerated to the point of cliché - which very often strike one as his trademark - are very reticent here and, for precisely that reason, develop enormous strength. This doll's face is not as grotesque as in comparable pictures with similar motifs by Kippenberger, but it has something archetypically human, with one eye turned outwards and one turned inwards; and it seems to be floating in an alien cosmos of forms; but, somehow, it's not funny at all but seems to be helplessly lost; and this grips you. What do you see in this picture?
AO: I already said that this is perhaps my favorite work. True, a few odd materials have been used, such as building foam, aluminium foil and glossy enamel paint. But what's lacking is humor. That was something new for him at the time. He was unsure about these pictures, and looked at me strangely when I revealed my enthusiasm. He saw it somehow as a lot of nonsense, and almost apologized for the frame which he just slapped together from old pieces of stretcher.
TG: What's the other panel about? It looks like a badly wrapped parcel with a helplessly molten face looking out of it. Can one say that the theme here is the drama of dissolution?
Page [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12]
Page [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12]
TG: On the picture Plusquamperfekt - gehabt haben we see a house made of brawn. It looks like a Kiecol sculpture. Is that an allusion?
AO: It's certainly an allusion to Kiecol. He liked Kiecol very much, and found him pretty good. But I'm not so sure he liked brawn. That wouldn't fit. The arrangement of the hard-boiled eggs with the slice of cucumber lends the object a lofty phallic aspect.
TG: What does the title mean in association with what is depicted?
AO: It's a mystery to me.
TG: Can you remember anything about the origin of these eight collages that you and Martin Kippenberger jointly put together in 1984? They crop up in the booklet that Kippenberger made for your 30th birthday.
AO: At the time we were living in Vienna in a studio that Peter Pakesch had found for us. We had a joint stock of pictorial material on a large table, and we started on a collage individually and together. Mostly, he stood a bit closer to the Hustler issues and the spray where the latex sausages emerge.
TG: A little known but very impressive Kippenberger work is this alleged triptych dating from 1983, which you already mentioned. The astonishing thing here is that the satirical elements exaggerated to the point of cliché - which very often strike one as his trademark - are very reticent here and, for precisely that reason, develop enormous strength. This doll's face is not as grotesque as in comparable pictures with similar motifs by Kippenberger, but it has something archetypically human, with one eye turned outwards and one turned inwards; and it seems to be floating in an alien cosmos of forms; but, somehow, it's not funny at all but seems to be helplessly lost; and this grips you. What do you see in this picture?
AO: I already said that this is perhaps my favorite work. True, a few odd materials have been used, such as building foam, aluminium foil and glossy enamel paint. But what's lacking is humor. That was something new for him at the time. He was unsure about these pictures, and looked at me strangely when I revealed my enthusiasm. He saw it somehow as a lot of nonsense, and almost apologized for the frame which he just slapped together from old pieces of stretcher.
TG: What's the other panel about? It looks like a badly wrapped parcel with a helplessly molten face looking out of it. Can one say that the theme here is the drama of dissolution?
Page [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12]
Kippenberger
Hardcover, 29.7 x 42 cm (11.7 x 16.5 in.), 212 pages
$ 70.00
$ 70.00
A total of one hundred paintings, sculptures and drawings from two of the finest collections of the artist`s work in the world
Martin Kippenberger, Carmona, Sevilla, 1988.