PHOTOS: ANDREW RUSSETH/ARTNEWS
Ten years in the making, Skulptur Projekte Münster 2017 opened yesterday, with sculptures by more than 30 artists dotting the German city. After a somewhat dark Documenta 14 in Kassel, the Münster show, which was organized by Kasper König, Britta Peters, and Marianne Wagner, is a breath of fresh air (literally, as most of the sculptures are outdoors). Ei Arakawa has installed singing paintings in a field, Ayşe Erkmen has enabled people to walk on water, and Michael Smith has opened a tattoo parlor with a special focus on the elderly. And that is just scratching the surface. Below, photos of many of the projects with some commentary from my colleague, ARTnews Editor-in-Chief Sarah Douglas, and me. —Andrew Russeth
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The entrance to the video room for Mika Rottenberg, Cosmic Generator, 2017, at Gartenstraße 29.
Tucked in a backroom of a former Asian market, this video was one of the harder-to-find works in Münster. Classic Rottenberg, the piece ventures down a series of trippy tunnels, entered via holes underneath the metal domes used to keep plates warm. They seem to connect businesses on opposite sides of the U.S.-Mexico border as well as the stalls at the sprawling markets in Yiwu, China. The piece reveals a hidden network of women workers, surreptitiously communicating. The men, meanwhile, are ridiculous: a series of miniature Mike Pence clones writhe on a plate, and a man dressed as a taco wanders about, never quite becoming part of the action
Michael Dean, Tender Tender, 2017, in the LWL Museum.
CAMP, Matrix, 2017, above the Theater Münster.
Lara Favaretto, Momentary Monument – The Stone, 2017, on the lawn between Ludgeriplatz Square and Promenade.
Hito Steyerl, HellYeahWeFuckDie, 2017, at LBS West.
On several video monitors, robots are kicked and prodded to better equip themselves to save people in disaster zones. On another video monitor, children in a disaster zone in the Middle East ask Siri if robots save people in disaster zones, and when those robots will be coming to save them. And a woman tells a story about a 12th-century scholar who invented a robot who could make music. It's the usual abstract narrative from Hito Steyerl, one that digs into the world's current anxieties. Letters inside light boxes that double as benches spell out, in all caps, HELL YEAH WE FUCKDIE. The piece is made all the more poignant by its setting, the rather sterile, corporate lobby of the LBS West office building, which houses several futuristic-looking works by Zero Group artists like Heinz Mack.
Aram Bartholl, 5 V, 2017, on the lawn next to next to Theater im Pumpenhaus.
Jeremy Deller, Speak to the Earth and It Will Tell You, 2007–17, at the Mühlenfeld garden colony.
Hreinn Friðfinnsson, fourth house of the house project since 1974, 2017, in Sternbuschpark.
Michael Smith, Not Quite Under_Ground, 2017, at Hansaring 38.
For a recent article in ARTnews, 66-year-old artist Michael Smith told my colleague Andrew Russeth that the title of his Munster Skulptur Projekt, Not Quite_Underground, refers to the fact that tattoos, like people who are getting up in years, are not quite underground. Indeed, senior citizens get a discount at this tattoo parlor, located around the corner from a bar called Plan B, and the tattoos on offer have been designed by artists. Who will get an a black rectangle by Wade Guyton? The reading material in the waiting room includes an issue of AARP's magazine.
Partial view of Nairy Bathramian, Privileged Points, 2017, behind Erbdrostenhof.
Oscar Tuazon, Burn the Formwork, 2017, in an open area between Hafengrenzweg and Albersloher Weg.
It was a warm day when I went to go see Oscar Tuazon’s sturdy concrete oven, which made the fire burning inside it all the more awesome to behold. The area in which it’s situated features some dumped garbage, a dinky little skatepark, and abandoned-looking industrial lots—a nice place for a big cookout, or illicit activity. (See the police coming? Burn the evidence.) I don’t think I’ve ever been able to walk up and around a working furnace before—that is an trick. Anyone can make a fire in it—the artist has provided big stacks of logs and kindling. Given the burns and scuffs that this thing has already accumulated, I suspect it’s going to look wonderfully grimy after a few months of use. Tuazon is counting on it.
Nora Schultz, Pointing their fingers at an unidentified event out of frame, 2017, in the LWL Museum.
Nicole Eisenman, Sketch for a Fountain, 2017, along the Promenade.
Think of the world's great figurative fountains—enormous heroic musclemen grappling with sea creatures, enormous heroic musclemen who are sea creatures, and nymphets and mermaids being nymphets and mermaids—and now forget them. Nicole Eisenman's fountain turns the very concept of a fountain on its head. Her figures are chillaxing. One reclines, resting an overflowing beer on her stomach; one is misted by a snail who sits on her shoulder. One test of a great artwork is that people want to spend time with it, and everyone seemed to want to spend time with Eisenman's fountain: kids, adults, dogs. Nearby a group of bunny rabbits nibbled on grass. Historically, fountains were meant to embody a city's image. Please, let this fountain remain, and be Munster's.
Cerith Wyn Evans, A Modified Threshold … (for Münster) Existing church bells made to ring at a (slightly) higher pitch, 2017, at St Stephanus Church.
Christian Odzuck, OFF OFD, 2017, at Andreas-Hofer-Straße 50.
It is remarkable how many Münster projects would probably be very difficult to stage in the United States because of our country’s profound love of litigation. One prime example is Christian Odzuck’s contribution, a full-scale replica of a steep staircase in the local revenue office, the Oberfinanzdirektion, that was torn down on the same site less than a year ago. Zombie-like, it has reappeared, though now it serves not as a pathway for employees but as an open-air viewing platform of a quiet stretch of the city. It charms. But be careful enjoying it after a rainstorm.
Justin Matherly, Nietzsche’s Rock, 2017, on a lawn of the promenade, near Promenade, Von Vincke-Straße.
Ei Arakawa, Harsh Citation, Harsh Pastoral, Harsh Münster, 2017, in a field in front of in front of Haus Kump.
Click to read Sarah Douglas's full article on the work.
Emeka Ogboh, Passage through Moondog, 2017, a sound installation in the Hamburger Tunnel.
Gregor Schneider, N. Schmidt Pferdegasse 19 48143 Münster Deutschland, 2017—pictured, inside a room chez N. Schmidt.
Who is N. Schmidt? And why does he live in a mysterious space attached to the LWL Museum? Visitors waited up to an hour to enter this artwork, where only two were allowed in at a time; the line snaked around the corner of the museum onto the Domplatz. I won't give too much away, in case you plan to visit, but it is a labyrinth that involves a sink with running water, a cabinet with a mirror, backlit fake windows with strange shapes hovering behind them, and...via video...the sense that someone else might be in there with you.
Hervé Youmbi, Les masques célèstes, 2017, in the Überwasser cemetery.
Ayşe Erkmen, On Water, 2017, at Stadthafen 1.
An absolute pleasure. Erkmen has straddled two shores of Münster’s inner harbor with a metal bridge that is located just under the water. Ordinary people can accomplish the divine: you can pop off your shoes (or not) and venture across. After a long day of walking and biking in the sun, this piece offered a very refreshing respite, and is an elegantly simple city-planning solution. What divides could be crossed with a bit of bridge building in your own town? What other delights could be added to a community with a bit of ingenious thinking?
Pierre Huyghe, After ALife Ahead, 2017, in a disused ice-skating rink at Steinfurterstraße 113–115.
View of one of Sany’s Marginal Frieze, 2017.
John Knight, John Knight, A Work in situ, 2017, outside the LWL Museum.
John Knight is a man of subtle, sly, restrained interventions, and he was in fine form in Münster, hanging a supersize level on the facade of the LWL-Museum für Kunst und Kultur, which reopened with a large new expansion in 2014. It is, on one hand, a deadpan metaphor for the institutional power of museums, setting narratives and defining histories—keeping things level—and on the other, a practical, working tool. To my eye, it looks like the LWL is in fine form right now, standing up straight, but we know that, should it remain in place, Knight's level will one day register a tilt—everything lists, eventually.