PROPERTY FROM AN IMPORTANT EUROPEAN COLLECTION Albert Oehlen Muschel 2 1982 acrylic and metallic spray paint on linen 255.4 x 190.5 cm. (100 1/2 x 75 in.)
Provenance Max-Ulrich Hetzler GmbH, Stuttgart Exhibited Darmstadt, Hessischen Landesmuseum, Schlachtpunk. Malerei der Achtziger Jahre. Literature Sascha Anderson, Tiefe Blicke: Kunst der achtziger Jahre aus der Bundesrepublik Deutschland, der DDR, Österreich und der Schweiz, Cologne, 1985, fig. 43 (illustrated) Catalogue Essay “If it’s good, it’s beautiful—everything that’s good will be at the end called beautiful. But I like very much if you do things that seem to be forbidden and seem to be impossible, like a test of courage.” ALBERT OEHLEN It is immediately apparent that Muschel 2 basks in its deliberate abjectness. This work by German painter Albert Oehlen is characterized by a muddled, lackadaisical application of paint, self-cancelling subject matter, inharmonious combination of drab colours, and overall crude, unfinished air. Yet the painting’s brilliance rests precisely in this intentionally slapdash look, which functions as a clever, ironical attack on the classical tradition of painting, a medium that has perhaps too often been invested with grand notions of permanence, beauty, and truth. A bold assault on good taste and formalism, this painting can also be seen as a brazen rejection of the art market, which has historically coveted works of art demonstrating artistic virtuosity, a refined sensibility, emotional depth, mesmerizing surfaces, and profoundly meaningful or “smart” content. Modernism, of course, has always had artists who deployed strategies of negation. Recall poet and thinker Antonin Artaud’s cry for “no more masterpieces,” or artist Marcel Duchamp great offense to institutionalized bourgeois notions of “true” art through his inverted urinal, Fountain (1917). Even fashion has endured such critiques through, for instance, the ever-irreverent punk movement’s embrace of all things low and in the spirit of an anti-establishment ideology. Muschel 2 can therefore be seen as the artist’s critique of the conservative, humanist values represented by the long history of painting. Oehlen’s overturning of painting’s conventions is also the artist’s way of testing the medium’s resilience and limits—a courageous questioning of painting that reflects its indefinite position vis-a-vis the growing dominance of other art forms, such as video, performance, and even internet art. Oehlen attended the Hochschule für Bildende Künste in Hamburg, where he studied art under notable painter Sigmar Polke until 1981. His work has been exhibited at major institutions, such as Musee Cantonal Des Beaux Arts in Lausanne, the Renaissance Society in Chicago, the Kunsthalle in Basel, MOCA Miami, the Musee d’ Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, and the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Read More
PROPERTY FROM AN IMPORTANT EUROPEAN COLLECTION Albert Oehlen Muschel 2 1982 acrylic and metallic spray paint on linen 255.4 x 190.5 cm. (100 1/2 x 75 in.)
Provenance Max-Ulrich Hetzler GmbH, Stuttgart Exhibited Darmstadt, Hessischen Landesmuseum, Schlachtpunk. Malerei der Achtziger Jahre. Literature Sascha Anderson, Tiefe Blicke: Kunst der achtziger Jahre aus der Bundesrepublik Deutschland, der DDR, Österreich und der Schweiz, Cologne, 1985, fig. 43 (illustrated) Catalogue Essay “If it’s good, it’s beautiful—everything that’s good will be at the end called beautiful. But I like very much if you do things that seem to be forbidden and seem to be impossible, like a test of courage.” ALBERT OEHLEN It is immediately apparent that Muschel 2 basks in its deliberate abjectness. This work by German painter Albert Oehlen is characterized by a muddled, lackadaisical application of paint, self-cancelling subject matter, inharmonious combination of drab colours, and overall crude, unfinished air. Yet the painting’s brilliance rests precisely in this intentionally slapdash look, which functions as a clever, ironical attack on the classical tradition of painting, a medium that has perhaps too often been invested with grand notions of permanence, beauty, and truth. A bold assault on good taste and formalism, this painting can also be seen as a brazen rejection of the art market, which has historically coveted works of art demonstrating artistic virtuosity, a refined sensibility, emotional depth, mesmerizing surfaces, and profoundly meaningful or “smart” content. Modernism, of course, has always had artists who deployed strategies of negation. Recall poet and thinker Antonin Artaud’s cry for “no more masterpieces,” or artist Marcel Duchamp great offense to institutionalized bourgeois notions of “true” art through his inverted urinal, Fountain (1917). Even fashion has endured such critiques through, for instance, the ever-irreverent punk movement’s embrace of all things low and in the spirit of an anti-establishment ideology. Muschel 2 can therefore be seen as the artist’s critique of the conservative, humanist values represented by the long history of painting. Oehlen’s overturning of painting’s conventions is also the artist’s way of testing the medium’s resilience and limits—a courageous questioning of painting that reflects its indefinite position vis-a-vis the growing dominance of other art forms, such as video, performance, and even internet art. Oehlen attended the Hochschule für Bildende Künste in Hamburg, where he studied art under notable painter Sigmar Polke until 1981. His work has been exhibited at major institutions, such as Musee Cantonal Des Beaux Arts in Lausanne, the Renaissance Society in Chicago, the Kunsthalle in Basel, MOCA Miami, the Musee d’ Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, and the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Read More
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