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Nabarralde | Nabarra Papers
A
Talk with artists Joseph Beuys,
Enzo Cucchi, Anselm Kiefer and
Jannis Kounellis
Anselm Kiefer:
For me there have always been people who are ignorant, others
who are less ignorant, and others still who are very intelligent.
Joseph
Beuys: This is a question ofindividuality, a matter of personal
fate. There will always be various levels of ability. But in the future
all abilities will be malleable, the level will be elevated.
Jannis
Kounellis: Yes, but a monument like the Cologne Cathedral indicates
a centralization, encompasses a culture, and points the way for future
development. Without signs like this we would run the risk of becomming
nomads.
Beuys:
The Cologne Cathedral is a bad sculpture. It would make a good train
station. Chartres is better. But waht Kounellis says about the cathedral
is a nice image. The old cathedrals were built in a world that was still
round, but that in the meantime has been constricted by materialism.
There was an internal necessity to narrow it like that, since in that
way human consciousness became sharpened, especially in its analytic
functions. Now we have to carry out a synthesis with all our powers,
and build a new cathedral.
Kiefer:
It makes me feel terribly uncomfortable if what Beuys means is that
humanity would change if we change a concept. There have always been
different kinds of people.
Beuys:
That goes without saying. It's a matter of raising the level in every
domain. We agree that throughout history it's enough to see how people
furnished their apartments. They've never lived so degradingly.
Kiefer:
That's what we say now. But you don't know what people will say in a
hundred or even fifty years.
Beuys:
People will realize it and throw their junk away. They're already doing
it. After six months they throw their stuff away and buy something new.
People are absolutely unhappy in these apartments. At the same time,
the way one lives is an important and elementary expression of one's
artistic sense. The esthetic sense is disturbed nowadays like never
before in history. So let's build the cathedral.
Kounellis:
Right. This excess of nomadism and of rejecting culture creates an absurd
situation.
Kiefer:
The declining level is obvious. But last time we asked ourselves why
the innocent, primitive native, as soon as he gets a plastic bowl, throws
away his own.
Beuys:
They've become susceptible because nowadays the old tribal cultures
are no longer valid. Even if the're living in some tropical forest,
they're decadent. They no longer have any power or inner stability.
The moment something comes along that provides comfort, for example
a television, it's a wonder for them. The old tribal cultures based
on blood relations, and not on bonds of love or intellectual kinship,
are truly obsolete and must be dispensed with. The whole thing like,
for example, Indian cultures, preserved as if in museums, is nothing
more than sentimentality. It would be better if these people could develop
themselves. But, of course, they are subjugated to capitalism and usually
die out because of it. You can see this quite well with the Basque problem.
The Basques are really the abandoned vestige of some nomadic people
? There are thousands of theories that they came from Asia and, perhaps
as punishment by some tribal chief, were left behind. But they are there,
trying time and again to preserve their old tribal culture. But they
haven't developed their own literature, everything proceeds according
to oral tradition. Now they are, with good reason, making very specific
demands.
Jean
Christophe Ammann: Why do you mention the example of the Basques?
Beuys:
Because the context of the European Economic Community, within which
the Basques find themselves, corresponds to the machinations in the
system of the Western monetary economy. That is, the Spanish government
doesn't give the Basques any autonomy, and therefore a problem arises
-like Northern Ireland. In Spain I proposed that the Basques should
be given full autonomy. The Spanish claim that the Basques would then
degenerate because they have no indigenous culture. But then I said
that they did indeed have their own culture, just by virtue of the fact
that they wanted self-determination. It's even possible that these people,
just like us at this table, work out a concept for their own economy
which could be paradigmatic for many people. If the Basques were given
self-determination, it would certainly be much different. That would
provide a good opportunity to develop something paradigmatic, which
we could view like a work of art. We could then possibly sit down together
with them and develop something paradigmatic for the whole world.
Enzo
Cucchi: The Basques' method is interesting because they use terrorism,
but I don't know where terrorism leads us to.
Beuys:
Terrorism doesn't lead to a solution of the question. It leads us to
a totally boring, conservative social system.
Cucchi:
That's not what I meant. I just wonder which feelings are inherent in
terrorism nowadays, what form it takes. Both the Basques and the Northern
Irish use this code.
Beuys:
That's a typical example of reflecting about a phenomenon that an artist
finds interesting. It would be better if Cucchi became a terrorist himself,
then he'd be more experienced.
Cucchi:
Right. I believe that artists should arrest other artists.
Beuys:
At the moment, many artists claim they are inwardly terrorists, but
their works are part of the pool we talked about. Their products reach
the so-called connoisseurs, who don't understand anything. The works
come into this pool and effect nothing. Saatchi, for example, doesn't
understand anything about that.
Kiefer:
That Saatchi doesn't understand anything is not true. He doesn't understand
Beuys, and that's a mistake. But show me the collector whose spectrum
is as wide as we would like. A collector who, for example, understands
Warhol and Beuys --that's what we need.
Beuys:
It's very good that he doesn't understand me and a pity that he understands
you. But, actually, he only understands you from hearsay.
Kounellis:
Within Europe there are many peoples who want to be independent, for
example, the Sicilians, the Sardinians, the Corsicans, and others.
Beuys:
That's very positive.
Kounellis:
Yes, but it's also very positive to speak about the Cologne Cathedral.
Not only those who want to separate are positive.
Beuys:
The Chartres Cathedral is positive when one sees that such attempts
at independence lead to another system, so that the Corsicans, the Sardinians,
the Basques, the Irish, and the Scottish can build a cathedral at all.
I'm convinced that the Basques are doing it right. I'm not so sure about
the Scottish. You really have to begin with a small group and introduce
a different principle into an easily receptive community. The idea of
the cathedral means a different understanding of culture, justice, spirit,
economy and so forth. If the Spanish would give the Basques autonomy,
Basques would say" "We need nothing more desperately than such talks,
since everything has to be erected from new foundations. We want to
give everything a new basis, the basis of art." They want the body of
society to be like a work of art. But terrorism may hinder these attempts,
since it provides the larger countries and powers with new arguments
to keep implementing police force, to become a military state. Capitalism
is happy to have terrorism. It's artificially bred by capitalism.
Cucchi:
That's right. But we're talking about the form of terrorism now, about
desires and astonishment.
Beuys:
Terrorism can, under certain circumstances, be an inner device according
to Heraclitus's method: "Opposition is the father of all things." However,
opposition should not cause destruction externally, but rather be conducted
internally. That was, of course, also Heraclitus's view; later they
said he wanted war...
Kounellis:
But in order to build a cathedral you need a method and an understanding
of the past otherwise you can't construct.
Ammann:
I believe we should speak more extensively about the ways and means.
We obviously agree about the ends. I'd like to address this question
to Jannis, since Joseph has already expressed himself at length about
this.
Kounellis:
We don't really have different ways. But we have a different conception
of history and diverse ideological evaluations.
Beuys:
Jannis, when you word it like that you seem to be a bit backward.
Kounellis:
No. I'm not backward. I'm talking about the future. What's "backward"
suppose to mean?
Beuys:
"Backward" means adhering to ideas that are common and old.
Kounellis:
Just because we've spoken about identity, is that supposed to be an
old and common catastrophe that resulted from the Second World War?
Five years ago this dreadful artist, Andy Warhol, came to Italy. And
this idiot, who was sitting at a table with Moravia and others, was
asked about which Italian artists he knew. He answered that the only
thing he knew about Italy was the spaghetti. Therefore, it's not old
and common when one speaks about history.
Beuys:
He was only being ironical.
Kounellis:
I spoke about Warhol in order to say that the problem of the cathedral
and the problem of cultural integrity --and this is the only possible
freedom, for you can't be free if you aren't integrated-- are tremendous,
fundamental problems for the postwar period in Europe.
Ammann:
Now I notice something curious. Each of you four artists is appealing
to human recollection dating back a long time. Of course, without memory
and experience human beings can't exist. Anselm does this through pictures
that awaken something very deep-seated in people. Jannis, by showing
fragments once belonging to a whole. Beuys, through a broadened concept
of art, directly remind people of actions and appeals to them to become
aware of their actions. Enzo, reminds human beings of their roots. This
means that the device of wanting to remind someone of something is the
essential factor in your work. However, this device of reminding is
employed differently. But the differences must not be understood in
the sense that they mutually exclude each other. Thus, it doesn't seem
possible to me that, if you have these shared goals and the paths diverge,
each artist could see his method as being the generally correct one.
Beuys:
We don't think so either.
Kounellis:
Kiefer's complete works appear to be morally very precise. But one should
see the differences from the historical expressionists. Historical expressionism
had an entirely different revolutionary origin, whereas that of Kiefer
desperately affirms identity. In my opinion, Beuys does the same thing,
of course in a different way. However, what Beuys says seems to be an
obstacle intentionally placed in order to conceal reality, or the impossibility
of speaking, or a trauma. I believe that we're much closer than might
appear from this discussion.
Beuys:
That was clear to begin with. We're not here talking together to improve
our relationship, which is good anyway. We're here to build the cathedral.
Kounellis:
The construction of the cathedral is the construction of a visible language.
Beuys:
That's an important detail. But today everything is possible, and so
the cathedral isn't materialized. We've agreed to build a cathedral
and to arrive at a really human culture. but we haven't agreed upon
how the cathedral should look, or from what material ir'll be made.
Kournellis:
Beuys has suffered severely, more than all of us. That's a feeling I
have because he's suspicious about openly discussing fundamental things.
Beuys:
Openness is, of course, a somewhat obsolete concept. Many people think
they are quite progressive and "with it" if they speak about so-called
openness. But openness has to be precisely defined. Otherwise, openness
means nothing more than that everything is possible. However, I claim
nearly nothing is possible. In order to have access to every single
point of view, you really need an astute sense of perception. But if
one wants to arrive at a consensus, openness must take on a totally
determined form, a condensation, and that's the opposite image of openness.
Openness is also a term used in propaganda. We've been seduced by this
word. People spoke of openness, of a pluralistic society, in other words,
and claimed that in the end everything is possible; and they just didn't
want any particular ways and principles, as these require a precisely
worked-out form.
Kounellis:
But we're individuals who don't let ourselves be influenced.
Beuys:
Openness should be human, related to the individual anthropologically;
open for what the other means.
Kounellis:
We're talking about an openness in the interior of Europe, where cultures
are very close despite differences.
Beuys:
Present-day culture is, however, really not determined by the Gothic
dome, but rather by a leading economic system that has shoved art out
to the periphery or into nonexistence. And when the whole system goes
bankrupt because the economic culture is on a wrong footing, then art
will once again have a good chance to construct an authentic culture
in every way rather than a stifled formation. I simply refuse to accept
that this microphone on the table in front of us is not supposed to
belong to culture.
Kounellis:
As long as the microphone is on the table like that, it can't belong
to culture. But when Beuys puts it on felt, then it becomes part of
culture because Beuys has the power to transform the microphone into
culture.
Beuys:
But the power only benefits me, it leads back to my individual actions
and not to the cathedral.
Kiefer:
Your work Erdtelefon (Earth-Telephone) hasn't benefited only you. I
also benefited from it.
Beuys:
I honestly have to say that if I set up such things like the Earth-Telephone
without mentioning the consequences or saying what I intended with these
things, without painting out the way in which the mystery of the work
leads to a much greater mystery, namely, that which moves people in
general. Regarding art as the only way to build the cathedral, I really
do need the spoken language.
Kiefer:
Before an artist has died, one can't completely tell what he meant with
his work in its entire spectrum.
Beuys:
It's just not true that the artist says something only after his death.
But perhaps it's true that a dead artist is better than a living one.
Excerpts from a round-table discussion entitled "The
Cultural-Historical Tragedy of the European Continent" in 1986 organized
by Jean Christophe Ammann in Zurich, Switzerland. Source: Flash Art,
The Leading European Art Magazine
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