Pop, Irony and Seriousness
Albert Oehlen in conversation with Thomas Groetz about Martin Kippenberger
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AO: He seems to have created spatial depth with a distorted game of Nine Men's Morris. Below it, in the centre of the picture, there's aluminium foil, and at the bottom there's a painted fried egg. This turns the aluminium foil into a mirror in which a "Neon-K" is reflected. On the one hand, the "Neon-K" is the signature of the picture, and on the other, a self-portrait.
TG: The central panel of the triptych... is that a nail-file pointing down, like a sword? This reminds me of your work on the theme of the "file", which reached its climax in 1983, or do you see any connection there?
AO: The file is in a case. But I don't think that he was thinking about my work. It's probably a "bathroom" cycle.
TG: What's actually going on in the 1985 picture Meinungsbild: Ich habe ganz unten angefangen? Is this amorphous something in the picture a stone?
AO: No, it's a cloud.
TG: I hadn't realized that. I thought it was an allusion to the recumbent basalt stones in Beuys' installation Das Ende des 20. Jahrhunderts [The End of the 20th Century] - where a cone-like section has been sawn out of each stone and then put back again. I see similar plugs in the Kippenberger picture, in these circular shapes. Or have I missed the point completely?
AO: I think it's a coincidence. In any case, I don't see any connection. In my opinion, Beuys' work was fairly contrived and demonstrated no particular wit. I would be surprised if Martin had been impressed by it.
TG: I like the sculpture New York, von der Bronx aus gesehen. It's a kind of objet trouvé, a sort of plastic stand from the stationery shop, the kind where you can put pens and pencils of different lengths. It was then cast in bronze. Doesn't that remind you of Jasper Johns' objects that question the reality of art, like the pot with the brushes in it? Or what do you think it has to do with?
AO: First and foremost, with bronze. From the Bronx, everything looks bronze.
TG: At the same time there's also this social aspect in the sculpture, the social goal, the possible or impossible rise in society, that can only be recognized clearly at a certain distance.
AO: In Martin's world, the social aspect was only what appeared in the media; in other words, mostly as a cliché - dishwashers etc. The relatively high plinth that belongs to the work already points the way.
TG: These Kippenberger guitars are also clichés. There are two different versions. From the type, it looks like a 1970s' guitar. Does the model come from the band, Kiss?
AO: If you want a visual depiction of rock, you'd best think of Kiss. At this time, we were invited to give lectures quite often. As we had no inclination to describe our works to date, we mostly read texts written for the purpose. Sometime or other we had this desire to make more of a show of it. I then recorded a film-music-like fanfare slapped together on an Emulator, and Martin had the two guitars made. In highly dramatic fashion we marched into the lecture hall with huge strides and wanted, Beuys-like, to explain the world using slate and chalk. But we were so nervous because of our entrance that we couldn't think of anything else to say.
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]
AO: He seems to have created spatial depth with a distorted game of Nine Men's Morris. Below it, in the centre of the picture, there's aluminium foil, and at the bottom there's a painted fried egg. This turns the aluminium foil into a mirror in which a "Neon-K" is reflected. On the one hand, the "Neon-K" is the signature of the picture, and on the other, a self-portrait.
TG: The central panel of the triptych... is that a nail-file pointing down, like a sword? This reminds me of your work on the theme of the "file", which reached its climax in 1983, or do you see any connection there?
AO: The file is in a case. But I don't think that he was thinking about my work. It's probably a "bathroom" cycle.
TG: What's actually going on in the 1985 picture Meinungsbild: Ich habe ganz unten angefangen? Is this amorphous something in the picture a stone?
AO: No, it's a cloud.
TG: I hadn't realized that. I thought it was an allusion to the recumbent basalt stones in Beuys' installation Das Ende des 20. Jahrhunderts [The End of the 20th Century] - where a cone-like section has been sawn out of each stone and then put back again. I see similar plugs in the Kippenberger picture, in these circular shapes. Or have I missed the point completely?
AO: I think it's a coincidence. In any case, I don't see any connection. In my opinion, Beuys' work was fairly contrived and demonstrated no particular wit. I would be surprised if Martin had been impressed by it.
TG: I like the sculpture New York, von der Bronx aus gesehen. It's a kind of objet trouvé, a sort of plastic stand from the stationery shop, the kind where you can put pens and pencils of different lengths. It was then cast in bronze. Doesn't that remind you of Jasper Johns' objects that question the reality of art, like the pot with the brushes in it? Or what do you think it has to do with?
AO: First and foremost, with bronze. From the Bronx, everything looks bronze.
TG: At the same time there's also this social aspect in the sculpture, the social goal, the possible or impossible rise in society, that can only be recognized clearly at a certain distance.
AO: In Martin's world, the social aspect was only what appeared in the media; in other words, mostly as a cliché - dishwashers etc. The relatively high plinth that belongs to the work already points the way.
TG: These Kippenberger guitars are also clichés. There are two different versions. From the type, it looks like a 1970s' guitar. Does the model come from the band, Kiss?
AO: If you want a visual depiction of rock, you'd best think of Kiss. At this time, we were invited to give lectures quite often. As we had no inclination to describe our works to date, we mostly read texts written for the purpose. Sometime or other we had this desire to make more of a show of it. I then recorded a film-music-like fanfare slapped together on an Emulator, and Martin had the two guitars made. In highly dramatic fashion we marched into the lecture hall with huge strides and wanted, Beuys-like, to explain the world using slate and chalk. But we were so nervous because of our entrance that we couldn't think of anything else to say.
Page [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12]
Martin Kippenberger in his flat in Madrid, 1988. Foto: Andrea Stappert
Albert Oehlen and Martin Kippenberger in his studio at Friesenplatz, Cologne, 1983. Foto: Bernhard Schaub