Joseph Beuys (German)1921-1986

Sculptor, Conceptual , Performance and Installation Artist

Materials & Associations

• Fat fuel,flexibility, basic of life

• Felt warmth insulator

• Copper female• Iron male• Animals innocence

intuition• Gold alchemy, magic

1960s

• Appointed Prof. Sculpture Dusseldorf Academy of Art 1961

• Meets Nan June Paik and becomes involved with Fluxus until 1964

• First performance or Action “Siberian Symphony” 1963

How to Explain Pictures to a Dead Hare1965

• Highlights the problem of communicating ideas and explaining art and creative work

• Beuys said “Even a dead animal preserves more powers of intuition than some human beings with their stubborn rationality”

The Pack 1969• Installation shows sledges (a pack

of dogs) rushing away from the VW van ( Hitler said that every German would own a V.W. after the war).

• Beuys ‘ explained – This conveyed a state of emergency the Volkswagen was of limited use, more direct and primitive means were necessary for survival.

• Felt and fat prominent again - shows the symbolic importance of these materials in Beuys’ mind. It suggests a story of life, death and rebirth.

Sculpture/Installation

• Further use of felt in this sculpture.

• Beuys wore the suit during an Action “Isolation Unit” at Kunstakademie Dusseldorf 1970

• Objects from Actions were often used later as sculptures/installations

We Are The Revolution 1970s• His work became more political• Thought Action Art could stimulate

a spiritual response from his audience that would facilitate a healing process

• Art could help transform society • Founder member of the German

Green Party • 1972 dismissed from Dusseldorf

Academy of Art for enrolment of 125 students without qualifications.

• The main focus of his work was dealing with the aftermath of WW2 in Germany

I Like America and America Likes Me

• 1974 visited America for first time

• American natives believed the coyote was an important god that could move between spiritual and physical world. However it was regarded as a pest by Europeans.

• This action was a metaphor for white men’s treatment of the native Americans.

• Highlighted America’s need to heal it’s own “wounds”

Vitrines

• This displays the debris of an Action in 1972 when Beuys and two students made a “clean sweep” after a May Day parade in Berlin.

• It demonstrated his disatisfcation with Marxism and Western capitalism.

Tramstop

• Beuys monument representing Germany at Venice Biennale 1976

1980s• Installation “The End of the

Twentieth Century” 1983-85• Developed from a plan to

plant 7000 oak trees in Kassel.• A piece of basalt rock would

be placed next to each tree.• Here the rock (dead matter) is

the main feature. A section has been cut from each and clay and felt inserted to suggest growth regeneration after a dark century

Influences

• Fluxus, Minimalism & Art Povre Movements (to a degree)

• Marcel Duchamp• John Cage• George Brecht• James Joyce • Rudolf Steiner (philosopher)

Artists Influenced by Beuys

• Art Povera Movement• Robert Morris• Eva Hesse• Bruce Nauman

• An important figure in modern sculpture, by advancing the use of unconventional materials, and inspiring

performance artist.

General Info• Regarded as most important German artist in the post WW2 period. He showed a way forward for

German Artists that differed from the American Abstract Expressionists. He also made it more possible for Germans to speak about WW2 .

• Pioneer of performance art or “Actions”. His performances contained powerful symbols of life, death, transformation.

• Political and social activist and founding member of the German Green Party

• A myth evolved around his use of fat and felt – Beuys supposedly rescued by Tartars who covered him in fat and wrapped him in felt to keep him warm when his plane was shot down in WW2.

• Fat and felt have associations with processes carried out in concentration camps during the Holocaust http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9_rYiBm_Qk