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WORKS TEXTS Himno Alemán Debitism - Breathing Course Elevator Bar Take Away First Decision (video) The Blind Man Nr. 3 Art Exchange First Decision (book) Artist Statement Beautiful Views Rettet Berlin Exuberance is Beauty Occupied El Dorado World View ZIG Give work away, take work away White Turkish White American Extra Host Ghost Guest My Berlin Artscene Wahlverwandtschaft Emergency Community Together Against Self- Exploitation My Job, my Hobby Wegen Selbst Aufgabe Art has Destroyed my Life Non Profit Money Annuntiation The Border Liner Project Zurich Days no MONEY 6 Benches for the Stadelmeier Square Tabletop Football Storing of an Idea + Selling Options Money Sculptures Structuring the Colours of the Public Space Light Work Renaturation of brown coal strip mining fields The Matterhorn Seen From Zermatt Thrown Universe None of these Words is True Barefoot Switzerland in Colour General View Here's the World Created 164 Countries 12 Houses 4 Seas 5th Dimension Gaps Between Flight Routes Miller's Cow Hornung Cricket Universe Kunst kommt von Kurr		CONTACT CV
	My Berlin Art Scene 2001 slide show, 54 minutes was produced for Galerie Articule, Montréal in 2001 and repeated at Galerie im Parkhaus, Berlin in 2002 My Berlin Art Scene (invite text) Taking part in Renee Baert's seminar for curatorial practices, I read statements by Renee about the traps a curator could step into. I agreed with all her statements, especially with the last one: "perhaps we are one of the few, who truly believe that the work of our life partner, or other close dear friend, makes sense in the framework of an exhibition." But reading it, I had to laugh, somehow frustrated by reality, because I thought right away of Harald Szeemann, the famous senior curator, who twice curated the Kassel Documenta and twice the Venice Biennale. And this year he did not hesitate to present his life partner with her first video installation. Her name is not Szeemann, it is Ingerborg LŸscher. Her production was supported by the soccer teams from Zurich and Winterthur and Hugo Boss, who is a main sponsor of the Guggenheim. The video became quite successful and I hated it because I thought that it was one of the most superficial things I have seen in the last few years. I don't want to discuss quality. First of all I fear, that we would fight right away. And than because I think that quality in art is something very personal, something everybody likes to decide on his own and even if I want to be objective, I know that I am not. And there are so many reasons why I am not. I don't want to talk about my misunderstanding in terms of culture, skin or gender. I just realize that the art I am very interested in is somehow very close to what I am doing as an artist, or questioning myself. And there is so much art I am not interested in and when I ask my colleagues if they have recently seen something interesting, they usually tell me that they didn't, that they just saw the same old shit (or new shit).
	Nevertheless, the main audience of artists are artists. Being aware that my public are artists, I'm aware that my art production is produced for artists. And somehow I respect it and I appreciate it. A practicing artist is involved. He or she might know what I am talking about. Other people won't have that experience. Art is something you have to know about, you have to have experienced it. Then it becomes a tense process. Great experiences with art are disturbing, they force you to change your point of view, they may change your mind, your personality, your life. Afterwards, everything in which you were interested in before becomes boring and you need a new art thrill. In fact we all know, that it can take a very long time until a new (art) experience can top the best one we already had. Waiting for it, or experiencing it, anyway you can become addicted. Lots of artists confess that they can't quit producing art. Actually we love to develop ourselves, watching children you can see, that in certain phases they are interested in almost everything, but the problem is that the process of our own developing is almost invisible to us. While we are changing, we may only notice the change itself. We realise a certain difference and all what we can tell about is: "the world has changed." That might be the reason why I believe that art is subjective, why art is totally personal, why I want to decide myself which artwork is valuable to me. Simply said, the best art is the art I love. And this is the reason why I became one of the few who truly believes that the work of my life partner and my close dear friends makes sense in the framework of an exhibition (or a slide show).
	I would like to introduce to you my Berlin art scene. In fact, Berlin was not at all an art centre before 1989, but has evolved into one, especially because of its attraction to artists after the fall of the Berlin wall. This meant that the name Berlin as a trademark became a value in itself, and art shows were created proclaiming Berlin's position amongst the world centres. For example a recent show at PS 1 in New York was called "Children of Berlin". When I read through the list of the participating artists I realized that most of them were so-called international artists, and I was surprised that they were Berlin citizens. And I caught myself being irritated because I thought this one was French and she was English and she was American and so on. I am sure that most of them surely did not spend their childhood in Berlin, but in some periphery. It actually was the curator Klaus Biesenbach's Berlin art scene.
	The art scene I am going to present you is different from any other Berlin art scene. The criteria for choosing my participants are simple: they must currently live in Berlin, they should be professionally or emotionally connected with art and they should be my dearest friends. As a form of presenting my Berlin art scene, I choose the slide show, as slides are a very familiar media in the art world to present oneself and apply for a show. I asked my friends to send me 4 slides: One about themselves, one about how they live, one about what they like and one about their work. I asked collectors, critics, curators, art historians, actors, musicians, dancers, writers and artists. The average time of watching an object in a museum is 2.7 sec. I want you to look ten times longer at each slide. That means almost 2 minutes for each person. I am going to introduce you to 26 people: In alphabetical order: 1 Alessio Trevisani, Tänzer 2 Andrea Crociani, Künstler 3 Astrid Busch, Künstlerin 4 Barbara Prokop, Künstlerin 5 Birgit Effinger, Kritikerin 6 Birthe Zimmermann, Künstlerin 7 Carsten Eggers, Künstler 8 Cathrin Otto, Künstlerin 9 Christian Hasucha, Künstler 10 Dorothee Berkenheger, Künstlerin 11 Elke Heinemann, Schriftstellerin 12 Folke Köbberling, Künstlerin 13 Juliane Heise, Künstlerin 14 Katrin Jaquet, Künstlerin 15 Larissa Fassler, Künstlerin 16 Longest F. Stein, Kurator 17 Marbo Becker, Schauspieler 18 Ma.Ri. Brellochs, Künstler 19 Michael Grosch, Künstler 20 Michael Hirschfeld, Künstler 21 Michael Vorfeld, Musiker und Künstler 22 Norbert Heins, Künstler 23 Renate Wolff, Künstlerin 24 Susanne Bosch, Künstlerin 25 Stefan Krüßkemper, Künstler 26 Stephanie Niesner, Künstlerin 27 Yoko Hata, Künstlerin ∧∧ top