Page 82 - Studio International - September October 1975

displayed in the central space on subjected to fate, which is dimensions and the functional
Switzerland tables. 'I Read' is a collection of comparable with the cave connections between the rooms
rough, almost workmanlike
were stressed by the single and
paintings of the Stone Age. But
clippings from the daily press. fate has become less magical. The double rows of plates. The visitor
'I Went' gives the artist's symbolic system can also be read passed from one side room to the
The exhibitions organized by
movements in the course of each as an expressive but objectified other, crossing the central space
Johannes Gachnang at the
day on a xerox copy of a local portrayal of human relations. either alongside or on the rows of
Kunsthalle in Berne represent a
map (On Kawara travels a lot). Earlier works were copied and plates. The spacious central room
new attitude to the role of presented as 'Preparation' in the appeared optically larger and was
municipal galleries. Gachnang is '1 Met' names all the people the smaller areas of the Kunsthalle to
heir to a strong tradition of artist meets each day. The 'I Read' demonstrate the fluency of his given a floating quality by the
avant-garde activity in the book was started in 1966 and the intuitive work of patterns. The metal carpets placed at the corners
triangle formed by the cities of other books begin in 1968. Also exhibition orbited the central of the room, in contrasting shiny
Basle-Berne-Lucerne. The 35- in 1968 On Kawara began the 'I copper and rusty steel plates.
year-old artist/architect has Got Up' series of postcards. space to reflect the open-ended Andre's ability to recognize a
references in the paintings,
received an enthusiastic response Every day he sends two picture space and to give it an intelligible
postcards to friends on which he centering and then straying from sensual quality has never been so
to his series of one-man the established order. The axis of
exhibitions of On Kawara (Aug- gives the time and the place of his striking. No photograph can
daily 'getting up' into life. The orientation formerly symbolized approximate to the experience of
Oct 74), A. R. Penck (Feb-April
75) and Carl Andre (April-June poster of the show reproduced the by the cross is replaced by the the exhibition. Andre's use of the
overall structure of the 'Standart' alphabet. The space was based on the premise
75). Gachnang links the previous
theme of group survey shows to calendar. exhibition gave Penck the of making one installation from
The more 'painterly' painting opportunity to demonstrate his several pieces. For example, a
the collective attitude which also
resulted in the political action of of A. R. Penck showed his advice to children - practise copper piece covered one angle of
anthropological views on canvas imagination to see first what the floor of the square room: it
1968. Andre's work had previously
and in a series of notebooks in you can do and then what you did not trace a diagonal but united
been seen in Berne in Harald
which he develops signs for cannot do. In the rooms which the room, bringing the empty part
Szeemann's group show When
images and images of linguistic prepared the public for this of the floor into harmony with
Attitudes Become Form. That
reality. Penck's alphabet of maxim two identical series of the large rectangular corner-
exhibition was a fresh approach
human figures and their symbols 'Trialektik' (instead of dialectic) pieces. Looking into the room
to new work, but the time now
(Ralf Winkler alias Penck was were placed between the through the doors you could only
demands a complex analysis of a
trained as a mathematician, figurative paintings: three black possibly see part of the
single artist's work. Gachnang's
three main exhibitions reflect a dancer, and musician in East spheres next to a vertical installation - but it was possible
Germany) provides the onlooker symmetrical axis. The 'multilectic' to imagine it either from memory
personal analysis independent of
the politics of the international with a method of seeing which of the larger paintings is or by completing the partial
highlights the multicentred field represented by six black spheres image. This is the visual element
art world. The exhibitions were
planned in close co-operation with of orientation we all act within. _on both sides of an axis formed of the art which cannot be
the artists and realized with a His visionary thinking about the by the letter T, the initial of presented in reproductions
craftsman's care for the gallery world in general and the Penck's latest pseudonym, for the unless the work is intended for
individual's access to it may have imaginative role of Tancred that medium. Therefore the
space. Each installation expressed
the artist's sensibility by suggested the pattern for the Mitchell, a beat musician. The invitation card and the poster
designing the exhibition as part of Berne installation. As Penck painting is inscribed with rotating simply showed Andre's diagram
the artist's work. cannot visit West Germany he words 'construction, instruction, of the basic conditions of art
Gachnang utilizes the building's planned the exhibition from a map destruction ...' He concludes production. Andre insisted that
assets. It is a well-planned, and photographs of the space and with an image of his personal his exhibition should not exceed
functional building in the centre in discussions with Gachnang and fate in the small 'TM' series, the normal cost of Kunsthalle
of Berne, founded and built in his intermediary Cologne art where miniature human figures shows and therefore provided the
1918 by the artists of the city. dealer Michael Werner on their fall into the gap made by the copper plates from one of his
Gachnang has worked with visits to East Berlin. Penck's gigantic initials. dealers who owed him money.
artists for many years, and his main theme of developing The Carl Andre exhibition was Gachnang recognizes that his
experience has led him to work intuition through visual an environment which could be way of thinking was shaped
on exhibitions alongside an experience was unfolded in the seen and understood when he trained as an architect
intermediary who has a special large format (95 95") series of simultaneously by following the with Hans Scharoun in Berlin, to
relationship with the artist 'Standart', his symmetrical symbol carpet of copper plates which led whom he dedicated his first
concerned. for men and exaltation. These through all the rooms. Any view exhibition in Berne. His own
With the On Kawara exhibition paintings provided a 'feast' of of the installation made it artistic ambitions are, he feels,
Gachnang wanted simply to dancing figures tumbling all over possible to complete the better realized by some other
present him as a good painter. He the surface in the central space exhibition in your imagination. artists. Between 1972/3 he
of the exhibition. In these new The work totally related to the
worked with Kasper Koenig to organized exhibitions of recent
present the artist's production of paintings the exchange of forces building and the space. Andre tendencies in art in the
1973, which is the last complete of the 'Standart' remains used, with two exceptions, shiny improvised gallery space of the
year in On Kawara's calendar of copper plates which reflected the Goethe Institute in Amsterdam.
the 20th century. On his map of A. R. Penck light coming through the glass The building was a canal house
the century On Kawara marks the Installation, Kunsthalle, Berne 1975 roof of the Kunsthalle. The main which was available for
Photo: B. Burckhard
day of his life and the days on exhibitions for two years before
which he makes a 'Date it was due for restoration. The
Painting.' The 'Date Paintings' exhibitions he organized
are small grey monochrome included Penck, Baselitz, Polke
canvases which give in distinct and Raetz.
white characters the date on
His reliance upon personal
which they were painted. Each
initiative in Amsterdam proved a
painting is kept in a specially
useful training in overcoming the
made cardboard box. Part of an difficulties posed by the modest
entire page from a local
budget in Berne. This was
newspaper of the day lines the recently cut down to SF 450,000
box, plus the subtitle which is
because of the slight financial
given to each painting. The crisis in Switzerland. The Canton
exhibition catalogue unfolds this of Berne gives one-fifth and the
information from On Kawara's city four-fifths of this amount.
journal of documentation in the The gallery staff consists of
same systematic way that the Gachnang, two secretaries and a
exhibition was organized. The housekeeper. They all help in
paintings were hung on the walls other ways to avoid expense. The
in chronological order, Bernese section of the GSM BA,
reinforcing the unique quality of the Swiss union of painters,
personal/impersonal moments in sculptors and architects with 185
a life. The year's production of local members, has the right to
'works on paper' increased the two annual shows in the
the austere dignity of the work,
Kunsthalle, plus a local exhibition
158