Erwin Wurm
11 Mar - 25 Jun 2011
ERWIN WURM
I am Erwin Wurm
11 March - 25. June, 2011
Since the late 1980s, the Austrian sculptor Erwin Wurm (born 1954) has distinguished himself as an innovative and highly original artist. Employing a special form of humorous cynicism, he has created a sculptural space where laughter is the key to understanding his work, and where art leaves room for reflection and critical consideration of important contemporary issues.
Wurm has made a name for himself internationally with his provocative, boundary-crossing and thought-provoking sculptures. His work in this medium challenges the sculptural field and constitutes a new departure in terms of both form and content. The distinctive and unique character of his work is in part inspired by Pop art, Minimalism and Conceptual art, mixed by Wurm with an unfailing sense of style in pertinent statements on existential and philosophical problems.
Wurm perceives everything as sculpture. Using photography, video, performance and installation, he works in sculpture as an expanded field in which creating a design or performing daily tasks are understood as sculpture: Everything is a sculptural act, the artist says, since everything deep down is about volume. When he lets his sculptural objects grow in size or become smaller, it is thus in order to explore the elasticity and mass of the form.
With true genius, Wurm examines his surroundings, human behaviour and culture. His sculptures wedge themselves into discussions of contemporary cultural values: consumerism, materialism, superficiality, individualism versus collectivity, the psychological mechanisms of obesity, social phenomena such as political correctness and the dividing line between the private and the public sphere.
Wurms distinguishing mark is a revealing cynicism made palatable by ironic and humorous imagery. By making use of surprise and exaggeration, caricature and banality, his works evoke laughter. This opens the possibility of discussing complex affairs that extend beyond sculptural form and expression. Wurm himself sees humour as a potential instrument of social criticism a way of subversively turning things upside down and thereby commenting on the world in general. Wurm constantly plays with political incorrectness, evoking laughter but also thoughtful consideration of a particular situation and consequently of the questions raised by the artist.
There has been much theoretical writing on the significance of laughter. It can be discussed seriously on several levels: as a bringer of release, as a bridge-builder, as a unifying factor, and not least as an instrument of critical, satirical flogging of contemporary life. And that is precisely what Wurms sculptures achieve. They use laughter to provide a spontaneous experience of art, placing a mirror before ourselves and our culture that allows us to reflect on our own time.
Sculpture in the Expanded Field
In 1978, the American art critic Rosalind Krauss wrote an essay on sculpture in the expanded field. Her starting point was the attempts made in the 1960s to puncture earlier traditions and modernist sculpture in particular. Freed from its base, modernist sculpture had developed an abstract formal language based on its own premises. This self-referential language caused many artists of the 1960s to experiment with the styles and limits of modern art. The sculptural field was expanded to encompass gigantic land-art projects, minimalist explorations of geometric forms and the use of informal everyday materials; performance, video and other new media were also incorporated.
Erwin Wurms work grew out of these experiments. In continuation of Krauss' reflections on the new concept of sculpture, it seems natural to speak of Wurms sculptural practice as an expanded field, conceptually beyond conventional categories and media. To Wurm it is the process behind it which constitutes the sculpture: Houses, cars and figures undergo processes of change in his work, their forms are caricaturized and distorted, but without robbing them of recognizability and figuration. The artist explores oppositions such as volume/immateriality, space/emptiness, presence/absence, familiar/alien, function/dysfunction. These are in principle fundamental, classic considerations, but Wurm distorts and deforms, producing bizarre and grotesque expressions to counterbalance classic sculptural virtues.
It is all about scale. Proportion. Volume and mass. How as a sculptor you add and subtract. And Wurm uses the human body as a parameter in his considerations of these essential sculptural themes. To Wurm the body is inescapable as an artistic material when discussing sculptural, cultural, psychological or social issues. It can be in the form of actual, recognizable figures or as a physical measuring stick for the viewers bodily experience of the scale and proportions of a work.
Laughter as a Driving Force
One of the striking characteristics of Wurms practice as a sculptor is his immediately understandable, humorous imagery, revealing a distinct, underlying cynicism, an ironic verification of the state of the world.. The encounter with his grotesque objects cause wonder and hesitation that immediately give way to laughter. Wurm has thus opened a possible path to understanding his art. Why do we laugh when we see one of Wurms works? The meaning of his art lies in the answer to this question, for laughter leads to speculation as to what caused it. There is a moment, a space, where humour opens up thought. Laughter is a universal reaction rooted in the human body and thus makes the critical statements in Wurms work more general, accessible and understandable.
The thoughts expressed by the Russian philosopher Mikhail Bakhtin (1885-1975) on humour in art, and particularly on the culture of laughter, are relevant in this context In his dissertation on the French author Rabelais (1494-1553), Bakhtin discusses the medieval carnival as a popular phenomenon, focusing on the social implications of laughter. Bakhtins main point is that laughter is a collective means of commenting, problematizing, and criticizing the established social order, and that the art of the culture of laughter can make social paradoxes, hierarchies of value and cultural problems become visible.
Bakhtins reflections on the culture of laughter take as their point of departure the fact that laughter is rooted in the human body. He therefore perceives the body as a material, physical field, a universal principle true for all at all times. In other words, spiritual and abstract themes are discussed on an earthy, material and corporeal level. This part of Bakhtins philosophy describes characteristics of Wurms art, in which the interpretation of the works meaning is conceived with the viewers body and physical reaction in mind. In Wurms understanding of the body it is not an individualized, isolated unit, apart from the world but, quite to the contrary, a protagonist, actively participating in the creation of meaning, and representing the universal and the collective.
In Bakhtins view, laughter is both potentially releasing and at the same time critical and revealing. He is especially interested in caricature and comedy, and to him the use of humour in art contains both the aha-experience of recognition and an element of social criticism, degrading classic aesthetics and high culture and flogging seriousness, the rational social structure. In Wurms universe, the humorous approaches are manifested in comical, familiar, recognizable works, and these manifestations in Bakhtins words are united by the principle of laughter, which is about the banal, but also about the general and the universal. Here, too, the critical and complex are an inseparable part of the simple and uncomplicated.
Wurms humoristic works show parallels to Bakhtins culture of laughter which in many ways is comparable to popular culture today. And popular culture is where Wurms work is rooted, as exemplified by the easily accessible references in his work to consumerism, the entertainment culture, present-day bodily ideals and social norms. In Wurms creative universe the potential of humour is explored and used as an instrument to bring across the problematics of his work. We laugh in our encounter with his art, and this creates a sense of togetherness, while at the same time containing the possibility of reflection and raising awareness of conventional values.
Wurms artistic style suggests what could be called a contemporary form of grotesque realism. He uses figures, caricaturizing and exaggerating them. His art tests boundaries, transcends norms, and in others words functions subversively in regard to accepted rules and conventions aesthetically and artistically as well as thematically and philosophically. Wurm stretches the style of his work to the utmost, distorting proportions to the point of absurdity, thereby creating grotesque images of the present. It is humorous and serious at one and the same time.
By Curator, Anna Krogh, Kunsthallen Brandts.
Translated by Annette Mester
I am Erwin Wurm
11 March - 25. June, 2011
Since the late 1980s, the Austrian sculptor Erwin Wurm (born 1954) has distinguished himself as an innovative and highly original artist. Employing a special form of humorous cynicism, he has created a sculptural space where laughter is the key to understanding his work, and where art leaves room for reflection and critical consideration of important contemporary issues.
Wurm has made a name for himself internationally with his provocative, boundary-crossing and thought-provoking sculptures. His work in this medium challenges the sculptural field and constitutes a new departure in terms of both form and content. The distinctive and unique character of his work is in part inspired by Pop art, Minimalism and Conceptual art, mixed by Wurm with an unfailing sense of style in pertinent statements on existential and philosophical problems.
Wurm perceives everything as sculpture. Using photography, video, performance and installation, he works in sculpture as an expanded field in which creating a design or performing daily tasks are understood as sculpture: Everything is a sculptural act, the artist says, since everything deep down is about volume. When he lets his sculptural objects grow in size or become smaller, it is thus in order to explore the elasticity and mass of the form.
With true genius, Wurm examines his surroundings, human behaviour and culture. His sculptures wedge themselves into discussions of contemporary cultural values: consumerism, materialism, superficiality, individualism versus collectivity, the psychological mechanisms of obesity, social phenomena such as political correctness and the dividing line between the private and the public sphere.
Wurms distinguishing mark is a revealing cynicism made palatable by ironic and humorous imagery. By making use of surprise and exaggeration, caricature and banality, his works evoke laughter. This opens the possibility of discussing complex affairs that extend beyond sculptural form and expression. Wurm himself sees humour as a potential instrument of social criticism a way of subversively turning things upside down and thereby commenting on the world in general. Wurm constantly plays with political incorrectness, evoking laughter but also thoughtful consideration of a particular situation and consequently of the questions raised by the artist.
There has been much theoretical writing on the significance of laughter. It can be discussed seriously on several levels: as a bringer of release, as a bridge-builder, as a unifying factor, and not least as an instrument of critical, satirical flogging of contemporary life. And that is precisely what Wurms sculptures achieve. They use laughter to provide a spontaneous experience of art, placing a mirror before ourselves and our culture that allows us to reflect on our own time.
Sculpture in the Expanded Field
In 1978, the American art critic Rosalind Krauss wrote an essay on sculpture in the expanded field. Her starting point was the attempts made in the 1960s to puncture earlier traditions and modernist sculpture in particular. Freed from its base, modernist sculpture had developed an abstract formal language based on its own premises. This self-referential language caused many artists of the 1960s to experiment with the styles and limits of modern art. The sculptural field was expanded to encompass gigantic land-art projects, minimalist explorations of geometric forms and the use of informal everyday materials; performance, video and other new media were also incorporated.
Erwin Wurms work grew out of these experiments. In continuation of Krauss' reflections on the new concept of sculpture, it seems natural to speak of Wurms sculptural practice as an expanded field, conceptually beyond conventional categories and media. To Wurm it is the process behind it which constitutes the sculpture: Houses, cars and figures undergo processes of change in his work, their forms are caricaturized and distorted, but without robbing them of recognizability and figuration. The artist explores oppositions such as volume/immateriality, space/emptiness, presence/absence, familiar/alien, function/dysfunction. These are in principle fundamental, classic considerations, but Wurm distorts and deforms, producing bizarre and grotesque expressions to counterbalance classic sculptural virtues.
It is all about scale. Proportion. Volume and mass. How as a sculptor you add and subtract. And Wurm uses the human body as a parameter in his considerations of these essential sculptural themes. To Wurm the body is inescapable as an artistic material when discussing sculptural, cultural, psychological or social issues. It can be in the form of actual, recognizable figures or as a physical measuring stick for the viewers bodily experience of the scale and proportions of a work.
Laughter as a Driving Force
One of the striking characteristics of Wurms practice as a sculptor is his immediately understandable, humorous imagery, revealing a distinct, underlying cynicism, an ironic verification of the state of the world.. The encounter with his grotesque objects cause wonder and hesitation that immediately give way to laughter. Wurm has thus opened a possible path to understanding his art. Why do we laugh when we see one of Wurms works? The meaning of his art lies in the answer to this question, for laughter leads to speculation as to what caused it. There is a moment, a space, where humour opens up thought. Laughter is a universal reaction rooted in the human body and thus makes the critical statements in Wurms work more general, accessible and understandable.
The thoughts expressed by the Russian philosopher Mikhail Bakhtin (1885-1975) on humour in art, and particularly on the culture of laughter, are relevant in this context In his dissertation on the French author Rabelais (1494-1553), Bakhtin discusses the medieval carnival as a popular phenomenon, focusing on the social implications of laughter. Bakhtins main point is that laughter is a collective means of commenting, problematizing, and criticizing the established social order, and that the art of the culture of laughter can make social paradoxes, hierarchies of value and cultural problems become visible.
Bakhtins reflections on the culture of laughter take as their point of departure the fact that laughter is rooted in the human body. He therefore perceives the body as a material, physical field, a universal principle true for all at all times. In other words, spiritual and abstract themes are discussed on an earthy, material and corporeal level. This part of Bakhtins philosophy describes characteristics of Wurms art, in which the interpretation of the works meaning is conceived with the viewers body and physical reaction in mind. In Wurms understanding of the body it is not an individualized, isolated unit, apart from the world but, quite to the contrary, a protagonist, actively participating in the creation of meaning, and representing the universal and the collective.
In Bakhtins view, laughter is both potentially releasing and at the same time critical and revealing. He is especially interested in caricature and comedy, and to him the use of humour in art contains both the aha-experience of recognition and an element of social criticism, degrading classic aesthetics and high culture and flogging seriousness, the rational social structure. In Wurms universe, the humorous approaches are manifested in comical, familiar, recognizable works, and these manifestations in Bakhtins words are united by the principle of laughter, which is about the banal, but also about the general and the universal. Here, too, the critical and complex are an inseparable part of the simple and uncomplicated.
Wurms humoristic works show parallels to Bakhtins culture of laughter which in many ways is comparable to popular culture today. And popular culture is where Wurms work is rooted, as exemplified by the easily accessible references in his work to consumerism, the entertainment culture, present-day bodily ideals and social norms. In Wurms creative universe the potential of humour is explored and used as an instrument to bring across the problematics of his work. We laugh in our encounter with his art, and this creates a sense of togetherness, while at the same time containing the possibility of reflection and raising awareness of conventional values.
Wurms artistic style suggests what could be called a contemporary form of grotesque realism. He uses figures, caricaturizing and exaggerating them. His art tests boundaries, transcends norms, and in others words functions subversively in regard to accepted rules and conventions aesthetically and artistically as well as thematically and philosophically. Wurm stretches the style of his work to the utmost, distorting proportions to the point of absurdity, thereby creating grotesque images of the present. It is humorous and serious at one and the same time.
By Curator, Anna Krogh, Kunsthallen Brandts.
Translated by Annette Mester