Textiles in Museums: Alexandra Bircken

When I went to see Ellsworth Kelly at the Haus der Kunst recently, I took advantage of the „two exhibitions“-price and also went to see an exhibit by young sculptors in the upper floor, called „Strukturales Handeln“ (translates roughly as „Structural Action“). No photos allowed here either, so I am taking two pictures that were published on the homepage of the Haus der Kunst:

Kimberly Sexton, column 4

Kimberley Sexton exhibits plaster casts of space. Sounds unbelievable, but is great to look at. Definitely a must-see.

Michael Beutler, the gardens

And Michael Beutler constructs machines for each individual venue so he can do something in situ. Here he built an „Oberflächenaufknackapparat“ (translates roughly as „Cracker of surface structures“). This machine is left standing around next to its products, the whole back part of the room looks sort of like an unfinished construction site.

My attention was caught mostly by Alexandra Bircken’s works, though. Besides wood, leather, metals, plaster, stone and everyday objects she does also include that rare commodity, „textiles“ in her works.

Funny and clever her version of an instrument for spool knitting. Not a self-made yarn-spool, but constructed from old skis. In German, the little instrument is called Strickliesel, which was   transformed to a “Skiliesel” by Bircken:

Alexandra Bircken, Skiliesel

In other works she frequently includes pieces of fabric, yarn, knitted pieces.

Alexandra Bircken, Gewächs

When I first saw them, I was a bit disappointed. It bothered me that the textile parts are included looked so roughly made, obviously deliberately unaesthetic. “So why do those textiles that get included in modern sculpture have to be ugly?” I asked myself. Then I started searchiing the net about her, as I really did not know much about her before I saw this exhibit, and my frustration diminshed somewhat on seeing the variety of things Bircken has already made. (I also had that encounter with the drummers I wrote about here.)The way Bircken  includes everyday items such as a panty-hose or a skirt (sewn closed shut) still makes it possible for the viewer to have the original associations that come along with these things. You then have to figure out why they were put together like this for yourself. Perhaps if the knitted pieces included in her art were ‘nicely’ made, people would give them fewer thoughts? Beautiful knitting (or any other kind of handiwork) doesn’t qualify as art in real museums...

Here you can see a few more pictures of works by Alexandra Bircken.

And this is a link to another blog-entry which talks about Alexandra Bircken and newer works of hers.

The exhibit in Munich is still on until February 26, 2012. 

Anything goes.

My son has been playing the drum set since September, and is taking lessons. Sometimes he  sits down to play at half past five in the morning, more frequently he waits until way past half past six, and although he has made terrific progress in that short time he hasn’t really mastered the art of playing in low volume.

Just before Christmas his teacher invited all his students for a “Christmas Party”. The children brought Christmas cookies, the teacher served children’s punch, and then they watched two DVDs featuring different drumming events. I am not going to muse here about whether that is an appropriate agenda for a Christmas Party, or whether that might have taken place at any other time during the year just as well. Because it was my son’s first Christmas Party with this teacher, and we didn’t really know what to expect, my husband and I agreed that we wanted to go along, but that we would take turns. I went there with my son and my husband followed later, so I could leave. During the time I was there, I got to see the larger part of the DVD featuring a drum-musical “Stomp”. 

I have to admit that I had not thought about drum-set when I had promised myself that my son would be allowed to take lessons on any instrument he chose. I did not even consider drum set a real instrument. But my son has been a drummer all his life, looking back I even understand now that he already was a drummer while I was still carrying him. So he has taught me a lot about the fascination of rhythmic instruments, and I am beginning to understand much more about it, and even have started to enjoy it.

But I had not been prepared what I got to see in this film. It started with several people tied to a high scaffolding with climbing gear, and a large number of drummable items tied to it also. There were wheel rims, beer barrels, pipes in all sizes (metal and plastic), plastic containers, tin buckets, anything that resembled cymbals, and many more that I could not identify. Nothing that would ‘normally’ be called a drum. And those people were drumming, you bet!

Followed change of scene: broom ballet. The swishing sound, hitting the broom’s head on the floor, tap-dancing-shoes, ten people – you’ve probably never seen anything like it. Before my husband took over I still got to see Basketball-Drumming in an American backstreet, wet from rain, and a card-players-drum-quartet. When I left, not a single word had been spoken in the film.

So how is all this relevant on this blog? My son had been drumming on anything he could lay his hands on for quite a while before he finally got the drum set. Of course, this should have showed me a lot – namely that anything can be drum, anything goes. This was definitely brought across in the film: the whole world is a single drum. It reminded me of  Margit Amann von Gelmbotzki’s description in the supplies list for the Bauhaus-workshop in November: „Anything that fits under a sewing machine can be sewn!“ Or of the way of thinking of surface designers who look at things only under the evaluation of „can this be used to print on fabric?“ I myself have quite a collection down in the basement, waiting for the day when I will finally start using it. Just a few days ago I looked at the plastic roll which constituted the interior of a strand of satin used for wrapping gifts and decided that I was going to add that to my collection and test how it can be used in printing on fabric.

Anything goes, anything can be turned into art. Why do I still stick to fabric, piecing, threads and quilts? It might not be long now before I finally come up with a good idea what to do with those metal shirt hangers which keep accumulating in our basement after my husband’s shirts come back from the dry cleaner and I feel sorry to throw them away:

Daily Art Project as Dialogue: Daily Mail, part IV - art or not art?

Kathy Loomis and I spent almost seven months from September to April in a joint daily art project which we have reported about here and here.

In December, at approximately half-term, the whole project went through a crisis because due to some problems of their provider, Kathy was unable to send e-mails for several days, although new postings were still appearing on her blog. Before (and after) that crisis we had always made sure to announce to each other when we would be out of town, and we had either posted ahead, to be opened on the date indicated, or we would make up afterwards.

So as it is with crises, they usually offer you a chance to change or reconsider something in your life.  

This sudden and unannounced silence on Kathy’s part while new posts appeared on her blog left me slightly at a loss. I felt abandoned – and understood how important the whole project had become for me. And for my artistic development. Not only was I having fun preparing our daily mails. I was taking pictures at a higher frequency rate than ever before, and I was also taking different kinds of pictures. Some of these have meanwhile been published in our local newspaper after I sent them in on chance. (And I am even getting paid a token for each picture published, I just found out!)

During those days of not receiving anything from Kathy I spent a considerable amount of hours contemplating on the art value of our project. I realized that it was much more than sheer fun for the two of us. The concept behind the whole thing was the setup as a dialogue between two different people from two different cultures, though with at least a certain amount of shared interest. Kathy has already mentioned the cultural exchange aspect in her last post on the project  as we exchanged pictures of national or local peculiarities. But the dialogue also went beyond the immediated reaction to each other’s themes as they were developing, in that each of us started seeing new constellations or aspects which we hadn’t noticed before.

At one point, Kathy had started sending pictures of ‚men at work’:

Kathy's picture of 'men at work' on Tenerife

Now that was definitely a theme I had not been paying any attention to in my picture taking. (And I admit I haven’t taken her up on that theme, although I do ‚see’ them now - but I feel slightly shy about taking pictures of – to me – strangers when they might notice. These must therefore be considered my „untaken pictures“.)

In turn, I have been taking pictures of trees and markings in their bark which I call ‚tree faces’.

These Kathy hadn’t noticed before – but she said she would be looking out for them now, and she has since posted one on her blog.

The ‚found art’ parts in the exchange showed me a lot of parallels between art and linguistics, which had been an important part in my former life. The success of (verbal) communication is always very much dependant on the hearer of a message, which could also be formulated as „meaning lies in the eyes (or ears) of the beholder“. That’s true for art, too. Art is in the eye of the beholder - and with fount art it is most likely going to be the artist, first.

Fount light-art by Uta

Found art in Antarctica by Kathy

Part of the value of the entire project must have been the fact that we didn’t know in which direction the exchange would develop, neither in the beginning nor throughout the project. Sometimes, a theme would not be taken up – or only at a much later date. Part of the value was the fact that we did include rather brief notes of explanation with our mails, but both of us made sure that these were not too personal. It was a visual conversation with very few extra words put in. Part of the value, too, was the fact that we were doing it every single day. Which kept the project (almost) constantly at the forefront of our minds as we were always looking at things with that thought in mind: would this be worth sending as the next Daily Mail? Permanent repetition with the slightest possible variations gives one a more thorough feeling for what one is doing. Thinking about it, and then doing it again, either with or without alteration, does make quite a difference.

In conceptual art, the idea „behind it“ was sometimes considered as or even more important than the actual execution. In this case, however, I think that the execution was just as important as the initial idea, because none of us knew ahead of time how it would develop, and the final result and feeling of satisfaction at having fulfilled the commitment contribute to my personal positive evaluation of the project.

When we talked it over in April, and we kept returning to the point of „what about it is art?“ Kathy gave me her personal definition of art as „art is anything that makes you think differently about the world“. ‚You’ in this case was meant to refer to the recipient. It’s true for the artist, though, too.

More thoughts on Kathy Loomis’ statements

After posting yesterday I spent a long time during which I couldn’t go to sleep because I kept thinking about the whole matter of pictorial quilts, quilts in the art world, art in the quilting world, women in art etc.

This morning I talked to an friend of mine who is a goldsmith by training, and an artist – graduate of Munich Art School – and she pointed out to me that goldsmiths/jewellers face the same problem. Jewellery has a hard time being recognized as art, because it is considered decorative, a craft.

We both agreed on that it all boils down to the question of „what is art?“ What is the line that separates some kind of self-expression from art.

For example, when you see the following picture and know that it was drawn by a five-year-old boy, you would probably not consider it to be 'art':

However, if it bore a different signature, say 'Picasso', you might assume it to be an unknown picture dating from his blue period. (Far-fetched, I know, but let's just assume.)

Or, the above question put differently: „what sells as art?“ It is one’s own decision whether one is determined to make good art or whether one wants to join into the large group of commercial artists.
If you want to sell your work, you may also have to sell your soul. If you believe strongly in what you’re doing you might not have the nerve or time or need to sell what your are making. Vincent Van Gogh certainly strongly believed in what he was doing and didn’t spend a whole lot of time trying to sell his pictures. (Of course, he was lucky in that he had a brother who paid the bills). His pictures do sell well today, though. I think they do because he only concentrated on painting good pictures, and not whether anybody wanted to have or see them, as long as he thought they were showing that he was getting better and better in what he was doing.

Another point my friend and I agreed on was that if quilters want to be recognized by the ‚real art people’ and participate in the art market (i.e. get their share of the money on that market) they need to get out into the real world and meddle with the real art people. Quilters, however, tend to hang out with their fellow quilters, and as much fun as quilt festivals may be, they simply are a big family convention – quilters meeting and talking to other quilters. The quilt world is a closed circle, and an art critic is not bound to go on the lookout for interesting new artist talents at a quilt show, even if it be a large one such as Houston, or the international quilts festivals in Birmingham, England, or Ste. Marie aux Mines, France.

Then, of course, there is the problem of making art with a needle, the wonderful title of Kathy Loomis’s blog. Any kind of needlework – as making jewellery, weaving, pottery – is still considered a ‚craft’. And, as Julia from NZ said, many quilters are perfectly content with considering themselves as crafters.

In big business art, the artist has the idea and employs crafters to execute these ideas. Ai WeiWei’s catalogue for his "So Sorry" exhibition at the Haus der Kunst in Munich, Germany, last year, shows this very clearly:



Ai WeiWei's Map of China, as it is being executed,
photo of the page in catalogue




Ai WeiWei's carpet for the hall in the museum,
as it is being made, photo of the relevant page in the catalogue



Ai WeiWei's various tables -
photo of the page in the catalogue

Obviously he did do the vases himself.
Photo of the page in the catalogue

Ai WeiWei has the ideas, crafters execute them for him, and he earns the credit. Don’t know how well he pays the crafters … (Don't get me wrong - I loved the exhibit and I think he has great ideas, and I think it honorable that he would employ people to do the manual work.)

I won’t go into the fact that the very large majority of quilters are women. That’s too much to talk about tonight!

Let me – and/or Kathy – know what you think, I’d be very interested in your thoughts.