€20,000 - €30,000
ANSELM KIEFER (B.1945) Für Jean Genet Gouache on photographic paper, 77.5 x 60.5cm Inscribed Provenance: with Galerie Yvon Lambert, Paris, label verso Exhibited: Paris, Centre Pompidou, Anselm Kiefer, December 2015 - April 2016, p.60, illustrated in colour; Prison Sainte-Anne, Avignon, La Disaparition des Lucioles - Collection Lambert en Avignon à la Prison Sainte-Anne, May- November 2014, p.322, illustrated in colour Kiefer’s performances in the summer of and autumn of 1969, known as ‘occupations’ in which he wore different costumes including his father’s Wehrmacht uniform, the crocheted outfit he wears in this image, a white shift dress and a cheap ill-fitting suit to stage a series of photographs often adopting the ‘Sieg-Heil’ salute which was forbidden in post war Germany as a part of the process of denazification. He posed in various locations across Europe, which were historical and culturally charged, using the body as a means to struggle against the repression of memory and to engage with the national mythology of the Third Reich. These photographs formed part of two artist books : Heroic Symbols (Heroische Sinnbilder) and For Jean Genet (Für Jean Genet). Large bound books more akin to scrapbooks in their slightly crude form, with Kiefer using original photographs, alongside watercolours, found images and dried flowers. Of the outfits worn by Kiefer, the crocheted dress appears across a number of images, including this work, standing in his studio on top of a chair with his hands clasped in front of him. He has added to and reworked the image with gouache, blurring out the background with black while the white paint outlines the figure, presenting him almost as an apparition within the work. Using black and white he echoes the traditional photographic medium, drawing attention to it but also reminding us that they are not only documents but a surface to be marked, collaged, painted over or even torn. The title of this work ‘Für Jean Genet’ reflects Kiefer’s strong connection with the French writer and political activist remarking that reading The Thief’s Journal taught him the most about art and remarking, “I still feel the same fascination for the dichotomy he sustains between light and darkness, flesh and crystal, for his search for the duality between saintliness and abjection”. (As quoted by Mark Durden ‘Photographs as Skin via Anselm Kiefer’, Review of LAM ‘Anselm Kiefer: Photography in the Beginning’ exhibition, 1000 Words, February 16 2024).
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