“Helnwein” ‘Ninth November Night’”,
Ludwig Museum - Cologne/Musée de l’Elysée - Lausanne 1988,
text by Reinhold Mißelbeck, Simon Wiesenthal, Charles-Henri Favrod
and Heiner Müller. ...

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It was to our good fortune that Gottfried Helnwein also strove to break away from the museum and gallery sector in order to communicate with a larger public. This appeared on a grand scale on the site between the cathedral and Museum Ludwig, and at a time of "photokina", with its hundreds of thousands of visitors. The 100 metre picture wall did not fail to hit its mark: it induced bewilderment as well as aggressiveness. After a few days numerous pictures had been slashed, one even stolen. Gottfried Helnwein saw the exhibition as a process which would continue and be reflected in later presentations. The pictures were not renewed, but patched up, so that this reminder of the persecution of Jewish people would bear the traces of a lack of insight and understanding in the present day. ...

The lane of pictures between Ludwig Museum and the Dome of Cologne is one hundred meters long. Each panel is 4 meters high. There are thousands of people daily passing by the rear platform of the cathedral and by far the majority of them, only accustomed to the language of billboard-advertising, are baffled, indignant and shocked at the pale children’s faces, printed on large sheets of vinyl. The city council and museums of Cologne receive dozens of calls daily, finding themselves forced into a position of explanation and justification.
The Installation had barely been set up, when the first damage occurred: At night the large-sized child portraits, which had been made to appear distorted and old by the use of makeup, were slashed with knives; one picture was stolen. ...

The exhibition Passage(s) was presented by the Centre international d'art contemporain de Montréal (CIAC), a non profit organization founded in 1983 in order to present various activities in the visual arts: exhibitions, conferences and special events.
The Portrait
The photographic representation of people, whether as models or as subjects, is a theme of a group of works whose treatment foils in a way the conventional act of recognition. Such is the strategy of German artist Gotfried Helnwein. ...

Group show

Group show

group-show

"Ausstellungsoper", das ist ein Konglomerat von verschiedenen Elementen, von Bildern, Musik, Performance, Spontantheater und Video, die zu einem optisch wie akustisch bedrängenden Medienspektakel zusammenwirkten. Helnwein hat sich mit der gleichermaßen trivialen wie subtilen Ästhetik des Nationalsozialismus beschäftigt und versucht ihre Selbstentlarvung mit ihren eigenen Mitteln, wenn er zum Beispiel die Zuschauer mit dem ideologischen Gedankengut des Nationalsozialismus, etwa der Darstellung der "Gesäßformen der höheren und der niederen Rassen" oder dem deutschen Liedgut der Zeit über fünf Monitore in peinigender Penetranz konfrontiert. Oft sind es nur Wort- und Bildfetzen, die rhythmisch über die Bildschirme hämmern, begleitet von dem dumpf-leisen, zuletzt bis zum Dröhnen gesteigerten Sound der Patchwork-Gruppe, währenddessen vorn auf dem Podium zwei in deutsche Wehrmachtsuniformen gekleidete Köche ein pseudoreligiöses Meßritual zelebrieren. Schluß mit Knalleffekt - dann Stille: Von schwarz geschminkten Soldaten werden über die Treppe fünf Kühe hufdonnernd und hinter sich kleckernd in den Saal gezerrt. ...

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one-man show and Performance ...

Group show

Performance at camp Kopal of the Austrian army, February, 1987. Helnwein uses tanks and real ammunition ...

Austrian poet Wolfgang Bauer reads at the opening.
From "Song for Helnwein " and other works. ...

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