SCHIRN MAG
What you see is what you get
By Eugen El
For Timm Ulrichs the distinction between life and art is obsolete. The portrait of a “Totalkünstler” (total artist) on SCHIRN MAGAZIN
In a topical exhibition, the Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt follows artists in their quest for a contemporary form of self-expression.
What does one expect from a picture that is supposed to be a self-portrait?
What does one expect from a picture that is supposed to be a self-portrait?
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Self-portraits: artistic representation and self-representation. Traditionally, self-portraits focus on the artist’s external appearance.
UNITL 29 MAY 2016
These days, the traditional self-portrait is history. In the past, it was only artists who painted themselves in front of the mirror. In the age of Facebook, self-presentation has become a tool for everyone. We live in radically egocentric times. Day after day, our faces migrate into a gigantic digital image archive. How are artists coping with this situation? Günther Förg headless descends a staircase, Wolfgang Tillmans shows only his knee, Pawel Althamer his clothes, Michael Sailstorfer forms his name in large letters, and Sarah Lucas almost kicks the viewer in the face while Florian Meisenberg allows the viewer to participate in his life via smartphone live stream. Ironical, playful and deconstructive – artists no longer present their faces as they used to. They have moved on from self-revelation and hide from view, they deviate and distance themselves from their own ego. In a topical exhibition with about 40 positions, SCHIRN follows these iconoclasts in their quest for a contemporary form of self-expression – including works by Abraham Cruzvillegas, Ryan Gander, Alicja Kwade, Jonathan Monk and Rosemarie Trockel. The ego is experimentally evacuated. Now, only fleeting encounters occur.
VIDEO
HIGHLIGHT
CATALOG
The self as political issue
The exhibition catalogue “ME” presents a comprehensive overview of the iconoclastic processes to which the genre of the self-portrait is subject today, along with relevant subversive techniques in art, including humor, irony, decentralization, fragmentation, blindness, and obstruction. However—or perhaps precisely for that reason—the artist-subject has remained a leitmotif in contemporary art, although it is no longer associated exclusively with the image of the artist. The subject is a constantly changing phenomenon and thus difficult to grasp in a portrait.
FUNDED BY
GERMAN FEDERAL CULTURAL FOUNDATION
KULTURFONDS FRANKFURT RHEINMAIN
ADDITIONAL SUPPORT BY
SAMSUNG ELECTRONICS
Media Partners
SLEEK MAGAZINE, JOURNAL FRANKFURT
SCHIRN MAG
Being me. Being my body. Being a woman.
By Teresa Koester
The female self-portrait in photography.
SCHIRN MAG
Thoughts about the world: Wolfgang Tillmans
By Teresa Köster
Stereotypes are something artist Wolfgang Tillmans avoids at all costs. Because in his photos he is interested primarily in people as a multifaceted...
SCHIRN MAG
The internet as a mind-expanding drug
By Anna-Lena Werner
For three months artist Florian Meisenberg published his digital private sphere as a live-stream. An interview about his initial experiences and his...
SCHIRN MAG
The controlled Self
By Thomas Metzinger
Where does the human sense of self actually come from? An essay by philosopher Thomas Metzinger.
