Hans-Ulrich Obrist

Hans-Ulrich Obrist (2010)

Hans-Ulrich Obrist (born 1968) is an art curator, critic and historian of art. He is Co-director of Exhibitions and Programmes and Director of International Projects at the Serpentine Gallery, London. Obrist is the author of The Interview Project, an extensive ongoing project of interviews. He is also co-editor of the Cahiers d'art revue.

Life and work

Obrist was born in Weinfelden, Thurgau Switzerland. When he was 23, he organized an exhibition of contemporary art in his kitchen.[1] In 1993, he founded the Museum Robert Walser and began to run the Migrateurs program at the Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris where he served as a curator for contemporary art. In 1996, he co-curated Manifesta 1, the first edition of the roving European biennial of contemporary art. In the November 2009 issue of ArtReview magazine, Obrist was ranked number one in the publication's annual list of the art world's one-hundred most powerful people and that same year he was made an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA).[2] Obrist first gained art world attention in 1991, when as a student in Politics and Economics in St. Gallen, Switzerland, he mounted an exhibition in the kitchen of his apartment entitled "The Kitchen Show"[3] It featured work by Christian Boltanski and Peter Fischli & David Weiss.[4] Obrist is an advocate and archivist for artists, and has said "I really do think artists are the most important people on the planet, and if what I do is a utility and helps them, then that makes me happy. I want to be helpful."[3] Obrist is known for his lively pace and emphasis on inclusion in all cultural activities.

While maintaining official curatorial positions, he is also the co-founder of the Brutally Early Club,[5] a discussion group open to all that meets at Starbucks in London, Berlin, New York and Paris at 6:30 a.m., and is a contributing editor of 032c magazine, Abitare Magazine, Artforum and Paradis Magazine. Hans Ulrich Obrist has lectured internationally at academic and art institutions including European Graduate School in Saas-Fee,[6] University of East Anglia,[7] Southbank Centre,[8] Institute of Historical Research,[9] and Architectural Association.[10] He lives and works in London.

The Interview project

Obrist's interest in interviews was first triggered by two very long conversations that he read when he was a student. One was between Pierre Cabanne and Marcel Duchamp, and the other between David Sylvester and Francis Bacon. "These books somehow brought me to art," he has said. "They were like oxygen, and were the first time that the idea of an interview with an artist as a medium became of interest to me. They also sparked my interest in the idea of sustained conversations—of interviews recorded over a period of time, perhaps over the course of many years; the Bacon/Sylvester interviews took place over three long sessions, for example."[11]

So far, nearly 2000 hours of interviews have been recorded.[12] This fascinating archive is referred to by Obrist as “an endless conversation”. He began publishing these interviews in Artforum in 1996 and in 2003 eleven of these interviews were released as Interviews Volume 1. Volume 2 was published in Summer 2010. With the release, a total of 69 artists, architects, writers, film-makers, scientists, philosophers, musicians and performers share their unique experiences and frank insights.

The longer interviews in Obrist's archive are being published singly in ongoing series of books entitled "The Conversation Series". Thus far, 28 books have been published, each containing a lengthy interview with cultural figures including John Baldessari, Zaha Hadid, Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster, Yoko Ono, Robert Crumb and Rem Koolhaas. A number of Obrist's interviews have also appeared in the Berlin culture magazine 032c, including those with artists Elaine Sturtevant and Richard Hamilton, historian Eric Hobsbawm, and structural engineer Cecil Balmond of Arup.[13]

On 8 May 2015, Obrist interviewed artist and poet Jimmie Durham in Venice, on the social live video broadcasting platform Periscope, using an iPhone. Periscope staff had designated the video as "FEATURED", thus it was made available to a much wider audience than Obrist's followers. Unless this interview is published elsewhere, it will be lost as of 9 May 2015, as the platform does not store videos for longer than 24 hours. On an irregular schedule, Obrist has subsequently interviewed various other artists in depth on Periscope.

Curatorial activities

Obrist has an abiding fascination with the history of art institutions and curatorial practice. In his early 20s he began to research the topic. "At a certain moment, when I started doing my own shows, I felt it would be really interesting to know what is the history of my profession. I realized that there was no book, which was kind of a shock."[12] He has since helped to rectify this gap with exhibitions on curating and a book entitled A Brief History of Curating. This volume, which is part of Obrist's Interviews project (see above) compiles interviews from some of the leading curators of the 20th century.

While the history of exhibitions has started, in this last decade, to be examined more in depth, what remains largely unexplored are the ties that interconnected manifestations have created among curators, institutions, and artists. For this reason, Obrist's conversations go beyond stressing the remarkable achievements of a few individuals...Obrist's collected volume pieces together "a patchwork of fragments," underlining a network of relationships within the art.[14]

In keeping with his desire to explore the world of art and view it as an open system, Obrist has long advocated a participatory model for his activities. One early project, 1997's "do it", is an ongoing exhibition [15] that consists of instructions set out by artists for anyone to follow. In his introduction to the project, Obrist notes that "do it stems from an open exhibition model, and exhibition in progress. Individual instructions can open empty spaces for occupation and invoke possibilities for the interpretations and rephrasing of artworks in a totally free manner. do it effects interpretations based on location, and calls for a dovetailing of local structures with the artworks themselves. The diverse cities in which do it takes place actively construct the artwork context and endow it with their individual marks or distinctions."[15](sic)

In 2007, Obrist co-curated Il Tempo del Postino with Philippe Parreno for the Manchester International Festival, also presented at Art Basel, 2009, organised by Fondation Beyeler and Theater Basel. In the same year, the Van Alen Institute awarded him the New York Prize Senior Fellowship for 2007-2008. In 2008 he curated Everstill at the Lorca House in Granada.

More recently, Obrist he has initiated a series of "marathons". The Marathon series of public events was conceived by Hans Ulrich Obrist in Stuttgart in 2005. The first in the Serpentine series, the Interview Marathon in 2006, involved interviews with leading figures in contemporary culture over 24 hours, conducted by Obrist and architect Rem Koolhaas. This was followed by the Experiment Marathon, conceived by Obrist and artist Olafur Eliasson in 2007, which included 50 experiments by speakers across both arts and science, including Peter Cook, Neil Turok, Kim Gordon, Simone Forti, Fia Bäckstrom and Joseph Grigely. There was also the Manifesto Marathon in 2008 and the Poetry Marathon in 2009, which consisted of poems read aloud by artists and writers including Gilbert & George, Tracey Emin, Nick Laird, Geoffrey Hill, and James Fenton.[16]

The 2014 Extinction Marathon: Visions of the Future[17] linked the humanities and the sciences to discussions of environmental and human impact on the world today. It was programmed with artist Gustav Metzger whose research addresses issues of extinction and climate change. Notable participants included artists Etel Adnan, Ed Atkins, Jesse Darling, Gilbert & George, Katja Novitskova, Yoko Ono, Susan Hiller, Marguerite Humeau, Trevor Paglen, Cornelia Parker amongst notable model and actor Lily Cole and Founder of The Whole Earth Catalog and Co-Founder of The Long Now Foundation Stewart Brand.

Quotes

"I think great artists always change what we expect from art. And then there is the famous "étonnez-moi". In the conversation with Cocteau and Diaghilev and the Ballets russes which was a great moment where art met theatre, and there was this famous explanation, and they said "étonnez-moi!" ["Astonish me!"]."[18]

Exhibitions curated

2011

2010

2009

2008

2007

2006

2005

2004

2003

2002

2001

2000

1999

1998

1997

Pilot issue: Jonas Mekas (May 1997) 1. Joseph Grigely (June 1997) special issue: Christian Boltanski for James Lee Byars (September 1997) 2. Gilbert & George (October 1997) 3. Douglas Gordon (November 1997) 4. Marlene Streeruwitz (February 1998) 5. Annette Messager (April 1998) 6. Lawrence Weiner (May 1998) 7. Christian Boltanski (July 1998) 8. Itsuko Hasegawa & Dan Graham (September 1998) 9. Gabriel Orozco (December 1998) 10. Claude Lévêque (January 1999) 11. Hans-Peter Feldmann (March 1999) special issue: Martin Parr (April 1999) 12. Harmony Korine (May 1998) 13. Antoinette Ohannessian & Toni Negri (July 1999) 14. Louise Bourgeois (October 1999) special issue 2000: Frédéric Bruly Bouabré (January 2000) 15. Roni Horn (February 2000) 16. Richard Billingham (May 2000) 17. John Giorno & Ugo Rondinone (October 2000) 18. Rosmarie Trockel (December 2000) 19. Cédric Price (February 2001) 20. Ken Lum, hommage à Chen Zhen (March 2001) 21. Raymond Hains (July 2001) 22. Gilbert & George (September 2001) 23. Thomas Hirschhorn (October 2001) 24. Yona Friedman (December 2001) special issue: Navin Rawanchaikul (January 2002) 25. Matthew Barney (June 2002) 26. Christian Boltanski (June 2002) 27. Hanne Darboven (June 2002) 28. Raqs Media Collective (June 2002) 29. Edouard Glissant (November 2002) 30. Claude Closky (June 2003) 31. Yoko Ono (December 2003) 32. Paul-Armand Gette (January 2004) 32. special issue: bis Hors série (January 2004) 33. Philippe Parreno (April 2004) 34. Michel Foucault (September 2004) 35. Yona Friedman (October 2004) Special issue: Nancy Spero (April 2005) 36. Tacita Dean (May 2005) 37. Ed Ruscha (June 2005) 38. Ryan McGuinness (January 2006) 39. Richard Prince (April 2006) 40. Damien Hirst (September 2006) 41. hommage à Raymond Hains (November 2006) 42. Tobias Buche (January 2007) 43. Hreinn Fridfinnsson (August 2007) 44. Hugues Reip & Melanie Counsell (July 2008) 45. Robert Crumb (October 2008) 46. Carlos Cruz-Diez (December 2008) 47. Koo Jeong-A (April 2009) 48. Walid Raad (July 2009) 49. Ryan McGinley (December 2009) Special issue: Stéphane Hessel and Pascal Lemaître (May 2010) 50. Christian Boltanski (September 2010) Special issue: Pierre Reimer (December 2010) 51. Dayanita Singh (December 2010)

1996

1995

1994

1993

1. Liliana Moro (17 February-21 March 1993) 2. Eva Marisaldi (Opened 2 March 1993) 3. Douglas Gordon (7 April-9 May 1993) 4. Rirkrit Tiravanija (29 June-11 July 1993) 5. Didier Trenet (19 December 1993 – 30 January 1994) 6. Stephen Pippin (18 February-19 March 1994) 7. Felix Gonzalez Torres (March–April 1994) 8. Bas Jan Ader (30 March-29 May 1994) 9. Koo Jeong-A (Opened 5 May 1994) 10. Elke Krystufek (15 June-13 July 1994) 11. Christine, Irène, and Heidemarie Hohenbücher (15 October-8 November 1994) 12. Uri Tzaig (7 December 1994 – 8 January 1995) 13. Gabriel Orozco (8 February-19 March 1995) 14. Lucius Burckhardt & Paul-Armand Gette (1 June-9 July 1995) 15. Ugo Rondinone (14 September-1 October 1995) 16. Leni Hoffmann (5 October-5 November 1995) 17. Joseph Grigely ( 23 January-25 February 1996) 18. Jeremy Deller (5 October-17 November 1996) 19. Liza May Post (17 December 1996 – 5 January 1997) 20. Luce Irigaray & Siobhan Liddell (Opened 5 January 1997) 21. Mika Vainio (18 June-20 August 1997) 22. Marie Denis (3 October-2 November 1997) 23. Sarah Sze (4 December 1997 – 18 January 1998) 24. Manfred Pernice (27 February-5 April 1998) 25. Marie Legros (7 October-1 November 1998) 26. Rony Somek & Elliott Sharp (10 October 1998) 27. Barthélémy Toguo (13 April-30 May 1999) 28. Masami Akita – MERZBOW (9 November-6 December 1999) 29. Cédric Price (10 March-1 April 2001) 30. Lionel Esteve (July–September 2003)

1992

1991

External links

Interview Videos

References

  1. ↑ Field, Marcus. An object lesson in what goes where. The Independent, December 5, 1999.
  2. ↑ "RIBA announces 12 Honorary Fellowships". architecture.com. 6 October 2009. Retrieved 15 April 2014.
  3. 1 2 Roberts, Alison (October 22, 2009), Ulrich-obrist---the-god-of-planet-art.do Hans Ulrich Obrist - The God of Planet Art. The London Evening Standard.
  4. ↑ Leon Neyfakh (December 16, 2009), The Man Who Made Curating an Art New York Observer.
  5. ↑ Brutally Early Club
  6. ↑ Ulrich-obrist/biography/ Hans Ulrich Obrist. Faculty page at European Graduate School. Biography, bibliography, photos and video lectures.
  7. ↑ International gathering of story-makers at UEA. University of East Anglia. May 7, 2010
  8. ↑ Martha Rosler and Hans Ulrich Obrist. Ulrich-obrist/ Keynote Lecture from Martha Rosler and discussion with Hans Ulrich Obrist. Southbank Centre. Deschooling Society. Episode 5, June 8, 2010
  9. ↑ Stephen Willats and Hans Ulrich Obrist. A Conversation Between and Hans Ulrich Obrist. Institute of Historical Research. Kenneth Clark Lecture Theatre. Lecture. February 15, 2011
  10. ↑ Markus Miessen, Hans Ulrich Obrist and Armin Linke. The Archive as a Productive Space of Conflict. Architectural Association. School of Architecture. March 22, 2011
  11. ↑ Hans Ulrich Obrist A brief history of Curating Artbook.com
  12. 1 2 Neyfakh, Leon. The Man Who Made Curating an Art The New York Observer, December 15, 2009
  13. ↑ Ulrich-obrist/ Hans Ulrich Obrist at 032c.com
  14. ↑ Obrist, Hans Ulrich (2010). A Brief History of Curating, JRP|Ringier & Les Presses Du Réel, Zurich. ISBN 9783905829556
  15. 1 2 do it. e-flux. 1997
  16. ↑ Orr, Gillian. My Week: Hans Ulrich Obrist. The Independent, October 17, 2009
  17. ↑ Ellis-Petersen, Hannah (20 October 2014). "The Extinction Marathon: the art world's bid to save the human race". The Guardian UK. Retrieved 8 March 2015.
  18. ↑ Interview with Hans Ulrich Obrist Artfacts, November 27, 2007
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