A“Day is not all light that dazzles.
Nor night unlimited dark." Ragnar Thoursie
The Optimists – a world of unlimited possibilities (and adversities)a
There is a scene in Wim Wender's Himmel über Berlin (Wings of Desire) that made a strong impression on me when I saw the film in the mid 1980s.1 The scene still intrudes on my consciousness from time to time. I am not at all sure that my memories of the scene actually correspond with what happened on the screen. The main events, as I recall them, and the nature of the place are as follows: Two middle-aged men are standing by a kiosk in a shabby, grey urban landscape. They are wearing dark clothes and they radiate a sense of earnestness that is reinforced by the dismal surroundings. One of them is an angel and the other is a man. He was formerly an angel but he left heaven for an earthly life; a choice that is difficult to understand on this bitingly cold winter's day. The two men hold an intense but low-voiced conversation focusing on the descent. The man explains his becoming human by referring to the feeling of alienation caused by the elevated heavenly perspective when he visited earth as an angel. He craved for a sense of presence and to participate fully in the world of men and women – a world that is characterized by corruption and that has vast amounts of suffering and distress. The angel remains sceptical and gives an apposite example of what makes the human situation so difficult: the damp and the penetrating chill. "True, it is cold", the man replies, "but think of the pleasant feeling one gets from rubbing the palms of one's hands together and experiencing the warmth which, thanks to the friction, spreads through the body." Faced with this argument the angel is speechless and, perhaps for a moment, the angel thinks of joining his colleague: of becoming a human being in spite of the fact that so much argues against this course. I do not remember exactly what happened in the end, but the man's answer offers a degree of consolation. In his way of meeting the difficulties of life there is a quiet opposition which expresses a distinct attitude to life. He is an optimist. In Jan Kjærstad's novel The Discoverer, there is also a passage in which the principal character reflects on a question which has obvious links with an optimistic attitude to life: "In my life I have not, like many others, been so concerned with traumas and unfortunate affections, with things that pull me down. /…/ Of all the questions that I have had to address I consider this one to be the most fundamental: Are humans, pictorially speaking, descended from animals or from angels? Perhaps this is merely a variant of a further question: Should we let the past or the future determine our lives? Again: Who are we and who do we wish to be?"2 The choice that the main character makes is on the side of the future, but clearly the question of whom we want to be in a whole succession of circumstances and in many different ways is dependent on who we actually are. Humans inevitably live in the shadow (or the illumination) of history. The past has a strong grip both on individuals and the collective but the image of history is not given for all eternity and there is something hopeful in this possibility of rewriting it. The positions adopted by the former angel and the character in a book are expressive of an optimistic attitude to life that is more complex than the hearty form that appears, for example, in management literature. An optimist is not necessarily naïve. On the contrary, optimists are often expressly conscious of the fact that existence is full of pain and inequality. An optimist of this sort has a specially developed sense for discovering bright spots in what is going on and a capacity for imagining some other way of life than the current one. This is a perspective that emphasizes that there is, in spite of everything, reason not to let hope evaporate. An artist who was an optimist in this sense was the recently deceased Helga Henschen and her work unmistakably combines rebelliousness with good humour. On the walls of the metro station at Tensta, which she decorated in 1975 when she was 58, there are quotations from the sacred writings of the major religions as well as from the sources of wisdom represented by the world's literature. One of these represents a true optimist's defiance in the face of the world: "Don't curse the dark – light a candle".
Future is based on Trust is the title of an installation that Jårg Geismar showed at the National Gallery of Thailand in Bangkok in 1999. Imagine that you are standing on the threshold of a dark room – you take a few careful steps, feeling for something or someone that can help you find your way. Sound gives you an idea of the size of the room but it rapidly becomes evident that there is nothing like light. There is a very pale lamp in each of the power points in the dark exhibition hall and these spread a mild, greenish light. They acted as tiny lighthouses that led visitors through the expanses of darkness. This type of lamp is normally used in a child's bedroom in case the child should wake up and feel frightened of the dark. The points of light in the installation created the sense of confidence that is essential if one is to step out into the unknown. By analogy this can naturally give expression to the future. And even if one is of an optimistic disposition, the darkness may – in all its uncertainty – seem impenetrable. Future is Based on Trust is just one example of Jårg Geismar's interest in the problem of the future. That this is a recurrent theme in his art is evident if one considers the titles of several other major works: Future Laboratory, Future in Mind, Future is Based on Nature and Future by Feet.3 The titles often point to something that is important to bear in mind if the future is not to be a worse time to live in than the present but, hopefully, a better time. In Future is Based on Nature he gives prominence to one of the necessary conditions for human – and all other living things´- existence: nature.4 Few other matters are more important to our future than how we treat nature. What will happen if we fail to see ecological sustainability as an essential (though insufficient) condition for the development of society? And what will happen if we do not, to a greater extent than hitherto, make use of natural resources from a long-term perspective? It is no accident that Jårg Geismar's work deals with such questions. His artistic approach sees society and art as intimately connected with each other and in which artistic creation is in a potent field between the social and the aesthetic.5 This way of relating to art and life developed during the early 1960s, most especially in the variegated and dynamic Fluxus movement whose network and activities were extremely important to many artists – not least Jårg Geismar.6 This unusual combination of an open, creative spirit and a social and political consciousness contributed strongly to its attractiveness and makes it more relevant than ever today.7 Fluxus was also a forerunner of contemporary artistic practice in its positive attitude towards working in different disciplines: art, architecture, music and design as well as business and marketing.8 The important thing, according to Ken Freidman – one of the central figures of the Fluxus movement – is "creating social actions and life activity".9 With a view to clarifying the meaning of the Fluxus perspective he formulated a number of characteristics, among them globalism, art and life in combination, experiment, accident, playfulness, simplicity, presence in time and musicality.10 If there was a particular art form for optimists it would surely share many of these characteristics11 and, with regard to Geismar, it is evident that he works in a spirit that is closely related to this point of view. He shares an ambition of creating conditions so that many viewers/participants can find something that arouses their curiosity or that moves them. This democratic ideal is combined with an almost impassioned attitude to everyday objects and events which frequently form the basis of his art. He also shows a conscious desire to combine social and political aspirations with poetic and humorous dimensions, making the actual artistic expression a central issue. Within Fluxus it is important "...that the piece have something to do with the characteristic of the site or situation that the content of the work deals with"12, i.e. what later came to be called a site-specific perspective. Fluxus artists also seek to achieve, in the words of Freidman, simplicity and elegance in the actual result and though the ideas may well be complex they should not be complicated.13 This characterization fits Jårg Geismar extremely well.
There is an emphasis in Jårg Geismar's artistic activities on things that unite people regardless of age, sex, class or race.14 Fundamental needs like food, clothing, love and sexuality are prominent in his work. The social aspects of life, i.e. how we organize our dealings with each other, both large and small, is another fundamental condition of human life which his art deals with. I believe that this is an expression of his fierce curiosity about how individuals and cultures – with a handful of common needs – form their lives and their societies in different ways. It can also be seen as a desire to create and make visible connections between people. A necessary condition for all of this is a feeling that the world is essentially shared and that there is a genuine ability to communicate and to understand: that the world of people is characterized by intersubjectivity. Both in history and in our own time there are numerous examples that prove that this is the case, but one cannot deny that much speaks against this. What one believes – because ultimately it is perhaps a matter of belief – and how one is to act are problems that mankind has long struggled with. Even an optimist can, of course, feel doubt about the reason for looking brightly at the future, but this does not necessarily prevent one from, in the midst of this uncertainty, acting as though it really exists. In his work Jårg Geismar continually establishes relations between himself and other people but also with his viewers and between them and the world that he is portraying. WE MEET IN:::, living, loving and doing, Joint Venture, Touch Me Listen to Me, We Came and We didn´t Leave, Dreams of Communication, To Whom it May Concern, You, You and Me, Dependencies on Distance and If You Can´t Come in, Smile as You Go by15 are titles of extensive works that reflect this desire to communicate and to participate. A recurring way of portraying this is the rich use of lines that he draws between different parts of his pictures or of cables that bind together the various objects in an installation. The cables – often electric cables – and the energetic lines are elements that have always been present in Jårg Geismar's work and they can be interpreted as both a physical and a metaphorical expression of the dynamic relations that are constantly created between all the aspects of life.16 His entire work as an artist is basically characterized by an attitude that can be described by Martin Buber's notion of a reciprocal or dialogue principle. In his most famous work Ich und Du from 1923 Buber wrote that the basis of life is the dialogue between "I" and "Thou". This is even true in an ontological sense in that God's dialogue with humankind is the forerunner of all communication. The ego only becomes an "I" in relation to a "Thou". Human existence takes place in the tension between address and answer and the dialogue is a necessary condition if the self-conscious subject is to appear. Thus in an existential sense we are all dependent on the other and there is – a least on a philosophical level – a symmetry in the relationship between "I" and "Thou".17 Another central aspect of the condition of dialogue is the role of the look or gaze in creating both relations and identity. Unlike Buber's description of this relationship, with Sartre the experience of seeing the other who sees you is potent with a sense of being caught by the other's gaze and of a role being forced upon one.18 Surely we have all experienced the uncomfortable feeling that a scrutinizing and classifying gaze can create but we have also experienced the reverse. To be seen and confirmed in the eyes of the other – simultaneously to be created in the vision of the other. This more optimistic view of the exchange of glances permeates Jårg Geismar's work. This finds expression in all the pictures – both moving sequences and still pictures – that he creates with the digital camera that he always has with him. The subjective perspective emphasizes the role of beholder and the actual act of seeing. In the greater part of this extensive pictorial material his gaze is directed through the lens of the camera to other people, who often stare back. Their faces often wear a smile that confirms the contact. The family is the most fundamental context in which to exchange looks in this existential sense and therewith to receive confirmation of one's own existence. Families of sorts have always existed. They are probably essential to mankind from the point of view of mere survival. Compared with other animals, it takes an unusually long time for human offspring to be able to fend for themselves and during this period of dependency we need a network of people to look after us. We have also to learn how to function as members of a group. That a nuclear family of today's type is not essential is evident if one looks back in history but even if one looks at types of families in existence today or looks to other cultures than that of the West. Our nearest and dearest – however they happen to be organized – are a source of security and joy. Parents, siblings and relations are people whom we grow up with and with whom we share experiences. With them we see how new couples are established, how new generations are born and old one's die off, and how life progresses. Beyond the family, from a very early age and on until we are old, we make ties of friendship with people whose company we enjoy. Friends do things together. They play, accompany each other to school or to work, have secrets in common, eat together, gossip about this or that. With our friends we do things that we enjoy and when life is difficult friends are a source of support. Humans are social animals and in order to survive we need to feel a sense of community with other people. In Family, Friends and Disappointemnts there are a couple of hundred photos of family, relations, friends, acquaintances and friends of friends but also of people who have not yet become acquainted – which perhaps they may never become. This may be the result of circumstances but could also depend on their feeling indifferent or even hostile to each other; certain people one simply wishes to have nothing to do with. The vast majority of the photos show people at moments of fellowship and joy – people full of the brightness of the moment. The disappointments mentioned in the title are not apparent in any of the pictures. Very few people avoid experiences of sorrow and treachery connected with family and friends but we do not so readily display our disappointments, keeping them rather to ourselves. One of the peculiarities of life is the fact that it is precisely those people who mean something to each other who risk causing each other the fiercest disappointments. Not even an optimist can deny that life can develop in a way that can make death seem like a more desirable alternative than carrying on living. This may depend on a sense of irreparable loss, alienation or a sense of boundless shame but also – and probably much more commonly – of an illness which one has little chance of overcoming and which causes great suffering. Various thought experiments are conducted by moral philosophers in which suicide is one possible course of action and – even if it is usually presented as an extreme choice – rational arguments are produced in its favour in specific situations.19 But it is reasonable to assume that a decision to take one's life is, in the vast majority of cases, taken in much more stressful circumstances than the seminar discussions among philosophers. The paralyzing feeling that the decision to take one's life gives rise to in most cases is portrayed in Jårg Geismar's series of installations entitled The Suicide Room. These have been shown both at museums and in real-life venues such as a hotel bathroom where, with a minimum of props, he created environments redolent of an encapsulated desperation and its tragic solution. The rooms are filled with a sickening stench of spirits and there are objects spread around like indecipherable hieroglyphs from the dead person. But the installations also have a paradoxical beauty. If the truth be told, the mystery of death can seem attractive. This appears not least in the romantically coloured world of ideas in which the darkness and finality of death are as terrifying as they are fascinating.20 Suicide is a serious subject, but this does not prevent there being something tragicomic about the fact that the act of taking one's own life was once, particularly in the UK, a criminal offence. The unfortunate person who tried, but failed to take his or her own life could look forward to being publicly whipped. If one wanted to take one's life there was good reason to ensure that one actually succeeded.21 Suicide has not always been considered a shameful act but, at times in history, it was seen as an honourable way of ending one's days. Socrates' Defence portrays how the philosopher, having said farewell to his family, empties the poison chalice surrounded by his pupils and, with great self-control, awaits his own death.22
Jårg Geismar lives in Düsseldorf and he studied at the Academy of Art there from 1980 to 1986. Though Joseph Beuys was no longer teaching at the Academy his influence was still considerable.23 His ideas about art, life and creativity have been of decisive importance to Geismar. This is not least because his ideas were put into practice; they became "social sculpture", to use Beuys's own terminology. Beuys made a major contribution to formulating an expanded concept of art by sculpting not only works of art but also the ego and society. He wanted, with the help of art, to reform the basely materialistic society and, instead, to create a society characterized by a sense of community among people and a proper respect for nature.24 Jårg Geismar, too, in several of his works, has thematized the relationship between the individual and the collective. But he is also interested in different institutions and phenomena in modern society like fashion, art, economics and technology. These interests find expression in titles such as: Private and Public, Clothes Make People, Cables, Art is no Fashion, Public Copyright, Money, Money Come to Me, Low Budget and Peoples Exchange.25 Another work that deals with the position of the individual in society is Politics of the Children. This consists of classical theatrical puppets that are hung on the walls. The strings that brought life to the figures have been removed from the limbs and joints that they are normally attached to and, instead, hang beside the puppets. In a sense this mirrors the lot of mankind as described in modern philosophy. The individual is born into a society with patterns of thought and action already in place. Language, too, precedes the individual and, with social structures, forms the framework that establishes what we can think and can formulate at any given time and place.26 Both language and social structures are essential preconditions for mankind - without them we should not exist as people – but they also dictate the limits of our existence. There seems to be no position beyond the structure and language and any freedom that we have must be realized within this framework. The installation is a portrayal of the dilemma inherent both in freedom and in community, but in another sense it pays homage to the creative imagination of childhood and the freedom that this can, we hope, bring into existence. An important element of the work is a red case that Jårg Geismar had as a child. In it he kept his crayons, a pair of scissors and pages of newspapers from which he cut various figures and created his own imaginary world. In the installation there is a much-enlarged copy of the little case and during the course of the exhibition this will be filled with flowers created by children from schools in the Stockholm area. The work will emphasize the children's capacity for changing the world and there is, with Geismar, an affinity with Joseph Beuys's faith in the possibility of human freedom, but also in his struggle for everyone's right to give expression to their own, native creativity: "Only the creative person can change history and only by using her creativity in a revolutionary manner."27
Early childhood is a period in which the foundations are laid for later life. This is especially true of language. Jårg Geismar was born in Sweden in 1958 and he lived in the little town of Burgsvik on the Baltic island of Gotland until he was six years old, when his family moved back to Germany. Swedish was his first language and, even if today he is far from fluent in Swedish, he can still make himself understood. This personal history is relevant to It's a Wonderfull World, even though the inspiration came from something that happened in Stockholm in 1998 when he had received a grant to work in Stockholm. When he was returning home from his studio one day he walked by Hötorget where a television crew was filming. They wanted comments on some current topic from what, in such contexts, are known as "ordinary" people. The reporter came up to Jårg Geismar, posed a question and pointed the microphone at him for a rapid answer. There was nothing about him that revealed that he did not speak Swedish with total fluency and when the reporter noticed that he delayed in answering she turned round and asked another person who was passing. Jårg Geismar stood there feeling surprised and insulted. In one sense this was an insignificant event but it says something important about the state of Sweden today. One can ask oneself how people are treated who have a much stronger accent that he does. And what happens if one combines this with an appearance that is not considered traditionally Swedish? How is our view of a multicultural society influenced by the way that the media so exclusively focus on problems?28 The answer is probably negative and thus there is a need for something that contrasts with the negative images of the news programmes. It's a Wonderfull World is, both as regards its range and content, one of the principal works in the Liljevalchs exhibition. It consists of 22 banners hanging from the ceiling in the two central galleries at Liljevalchs. Each banner is almost 4 x 2 metres and some two hundred photographs have been printed on them. These portray cities, animals, nature and people in every imaginable situation but also documentations of his works of art as they have been shown in different places: in Japan, the USA, Italy, France, the UK, Spain, Germany, Thailand, Zambia, Austria and Belgium. Among all these photographs there are a large number of portraits of people who live in Stockholm but who were born elsewhere. They are from all over the world and the reasons why they are living here and what they do for a living vary widely. The size of the banners, the large number of pictures and, not least, their wealth of images provides the visitor with an almost dizzying experience. Most of Jårg Geismar's works, and particularly It's a Wonderfull World, seem to have been created in a spirit that sees in life a superabundance of everything rather than a dearth of things. Our longing for the world just increases the more we look at it and our desire to be a part of it can be realized every day – It's a wonderfull World! Many, perhaps most people, will be affronted by what they see as a lack of linguistic knowledge or evidence of carelessness. I have myself pointed out that the title is misspelt and have been told that that is intentional. When one regards the fantastic world that the pictures portray it seems petty to worry about there being one l too many in wonderfull. The feeling acts as a reminder of the importance of generosity – that we should not be too quick to criticize things that depart from the dominant norm. The World is full of Wonders.
As an artist Jårg Geismar maintains a constant dialogue with the world around him and is continually engaged in giving artistic expression to his experiences and reflections. This takes the form of a never-ending production of images: analogue and digital photographs and videos but also artefacts using older techniques such as drawings and sculptures. Just as important is his use of different types of creative, social and communicative processes as well as the use of space itself in the exhibition context. Mostly he works closely with the architecture of the institution but also in relation to its position and its history. At an early stage of planning the current exhibition he studied a selection of Liljevalch's catalogues from 1916, when the gallery opened, up to the present. His interest was affected by the fact that his father had recently died and he was especially curious to know what had been going on at Liljevalchs in 1928, the year of his birth. Of the ten exhibitions that were shown that year there was one that seemed particularly relevant to his own ideas: The Optimists. This was a group exhibition with 15 Swedish artists participating, among them Mollie Faustman, Ninnan Santesson, Olof Ågren and Great Knutson-Tzara. The year 1928 was one of the last of the famous "roaring twenties". The world was struck by euphoria: never again would young men be slaughtered in the trenches. Conflicts would be solved round the conference table in the newly formed League of Nations. The first five-year plan for the Soviet Union was launched in 1928 and poverty and hunger were to be eradicated by means of rational production and distribution. The seductive tones of jazz echoed through both the old and the new worlds and, to the dismay of many but also to the delight of even more people, traditions were being liberalized. Historically the title of The Optimists could hardly have been bettered. Looking at the works reproduced in the catalogue gives rise to a number of questions. At first glance it proves difficult to find a connection between the serious portraits and dark landscape paintings and the positive spirit of the title. Several of the artists had spent shorter or longer periods on the Continent and perhaps they had snapped up other currents beneath the euphoric surface and suspected something that others had not caught sight of? Just over a year later the New York Stock Exchange crashed – one of the elements that led to what many people have regarded as the darkest period of human history. Perhaps the act of creating gentle landscapes, intimate portraits and interiors was a way of lighting a candle in the face of the approaching darkness: militarization, the tramp of boots and, finally, a war that laid large parts of Europe to waste. Each era has its optimists. It is clear that there is reason to be sceptical of the development of society today, a development characterized by international terrorism, an aggressive superpower and increasing xenophobia. The number of homeless people in the major cities is increasing in several of the rich countries and there is a global market involving women – as well as children – who are sold to the sex industry as though they were chattels. This is a world in which the headlines of the evening papers report on whether Michael Jackson's nose has died or on what was not shown on TV of the latest episode of "Big Brother" or some other docusoap. The media – essential to public discussion – have in many cases become a claustrophobic, mirror-lined cabinet of news and pseudo-events. In sum, things look fairly dark. But in spite of everything – as an optimist would put it – there are still good reasons for not giving up hope. There is even a good deal to feel happy about: meetings between people, the beauty of nature, food, music and other moments of peaceful or intense enjoyment. If it is cold one can, for example, rub one's hands together, but there are other ways too. And honestly speaking: what alternative do we have (if one does not consider suicide as a plausible solution)? We have our families, our friends and the earth that we live on. In a poem from 1952, Ragnar Thoursie writes of how the open city's light "..rises up against the loneliness of space"29, very conscious of the fact that it is on earth, and not in space, that one can hear people's cries for help. Whatever one feels about it, here is where we are. There is not much we can do about it but we can always try to make the best of the situation.
An optimist is a person who is prone to action. The choice to defy circumstances and to take action is always a risk. But for the optimist, passivity is often a worse alternative than acting and risking getting things wrong. There is an aspect of acting that has to do with tedium. Action counteracts the tedium and sorrow that is part of the human condition. One acts in order not to suffer. The Optimists exhibition grew out of a strong desire to step out into the common arena and to raise the question of the place of art in contemporary society. One of the central aspects of the exhibition is the room entitled Be My Guest which faces the garden and the Blå Porten restaurant. In this room Jårg Geismar – together with a large number of invited visitors – will carry out an extensive series of events.30 There will be guests from almost all over the world, all of them highly committed to their areas of activity and interest: philosophy, art dealing, fashion, business, curating, psychoanalysis, gastronomy, politics and international conflict management, to name a few. Every day for the space of six weeks (apart from days on which the gallery is closed) there will be public discussions, lectures, guided tours, creative activities, happenings and concerts. Each on its own and taken in sum these will contribute to fruitful meetings between the public and the art, but also between people. It is a project in which all visitors are invited to take a more active part in the exhibition than is normally the case. One day each week will be specially dedicated to children and senior citizens who will do different things together with Jårg Geismar in the Be My Guest room which is suitably furnished for visitors with sofas, chairs, tables and suchlike. The exhibition contains a number of works that have not previously been shown – both new works and somewhat older ones. The other works can be considered as re-creations in that all the installations have been adjusted to fit in with the architectural space of the gallery. It has been our ambition to involve the architecture of the building to a much greater degree than is normal at exhibitions. The entire building will be activated by the fact that the rooms are transformed and incorporated into the exhibition. Taken together the various works provide a very varied progress through the premises with different impressions contrasting with each other: dark rooms with light ones, airy rooms with enclosed ones, calm ones along side eventful ones. One special feature is Geismars Bio (Geismar's cinema) for which the artist has put together an extensive programme of his own films – from hand-coloured collages from the early 1980s to digitally based films portraying various aspects of life in the new millennium. The title of The Optimists has served as an inspirational dynamo for the preparations. So far everything has been done with a view to the future and it is only now – when the exhibition is opened to the public – that it really begins. We hope to be able to offer the public an unusual forum for both enriching experiences and a more profound reflection on art, life and society. Be Our Guests!
Notes
1. Peter Handke (Screenplay) and Wim Wenders (Screenplay/Director), Himmel über Berlin/Wings of Desire, 1987.
2. Jan Kjærstad The Discoverer (1999), s. 149.
3. Future Laboratory, workshop with students from five universities in Bangkok, Thailand 1999, Future in Mind, National Gallery, Bangkok, Thailand 1999, Future is Based on Nature, Shingu Tempel, Japan 1987 and Future by Feet, 7th Architecture Biennale in Venice, Italy 2000. The reason for my naming particular works, workshops, lectures and exhibitions by Jårg Geismar, both here and elsewhere in this essay, is that he himself considers them a vital aspect of his work. The titles point to themes and, thanks to their associative character they arouse curiosity and thus become a means of communicating with the public. Since 1980 he has also produced stickers supplying the title of the exhibition, his name and address and often a telephone number to the particular institution. These should be considered as works in their own right (multiples) with whose help he spreads information beyond the traditional channels.
4. Animals and nature have always been present in Geismar's works. This is an expression of his fascination with the multiplicity and beauty of natural species and of the "personalities" of animals, their patterns of movement and their forms of life. With both humour and poetry he portrays our fundamental dependence on and relation to animals, but also the fact that man is part of nature. His exhibition The Optimists includes several works on this theme: Women, Men, Children and Dogs, Fish Poem, Falls, Flowers Inc. and the workshop Flowers for Peace, which is being produced in collaboration with school-children from the Stockholm area.
5. This attitude is based on the notion that art cannot exist independently of its social context or its "setting", which causes movements like Fluxus to value works that make obvious reference to (and thereby clarify) the social, political and institutional circumstances that are the conditions of its very existence – rather than cultivating the Kantian idea of the autonomy of art. That art is, in a very concrete sense, part of this world – and not a transcendental entity – does not necessarily mean that one seeks to dissolve entirely the boundary between art and life, even though there are several examples of such an ambition in contemporary art.
6. With regard to Jårg Geismar's relationship to Fluxus it is of interest that he studied both at the Academy of Art in Düsseldorf and at the New School for Social Research in New York, both of which were important centres for artists in the Fluxus movement's extensive network. The question as to how Fluxus should be described is much debated. Like many other writers on art I variously use the terms "movement" and "network", conscious of the fact that it is/was in no sense a homogeneous and organized group of artists but a much more open and changing forum. According to Dick Higgins, one of the founders, Fluxus was and is: "1. A series of publications produced and designed by George Maciunas 2. The name of our group of artists 3. The kind of works associated with these publications, artists and performances which we did (and do) together 4. Any other activities which were in the lineage or tradition which was built up, over a period of time, that are associated with the publications, artists or performances (such as Fluxfeast)." Dick Higgins, "Theory and Reception", Fluxus Reader, Ken Freidman, ed., West Sussex 1998, p. 220ff.
7. Both the openness and the social and political commitment of Fluxus mean that its perspective is of real contemporary interest. In several senses Fluxus is a forerunner of today's artistic practice; which is also true of the "relational aesthetic". This is a concept that was established during the second half of the 1990s to describe art which focuses on social processes but, in practice, it has existed for far longer – not least in Fluxus. Many notable works of art have been produced in this genre, but in recent times the relational aesthetic has, sadly, all the more often become an approach without any real commitment. The fundamental ambition would seem to be that of creating a sense of community among the group of people participating and the result of this is often an event at which people meet and mix – something that is both laudable and enjoyable – but it is seldom that anything more worthwhile develops out of this. It is all too seldom that they succeed in reaching beyond the circle of initiates and the whole event becomes almost private in character, even when it takes place at a public institution. Artists can also take part in major social projects where they can function as providers of inspiration and as creators, but the results of such interventions are often difficult to grasp. This may be because the artistic perspective has not been formulated with sufficient clarity, or that other – more traditional – parties do not consider it especially interesting. This may, of course, be a mistaken judgement on their side, but it results in the alternative perspective not being given any real space. In many instances, the relational aesthetic needs to be vitalized and clarified. In the one instance this has to do with our view of what the nucleus of the social dimension actually consists of and on the other it is a matter of ideas, of how they are established and of how they are expressed.
8. Ken Freidman, "Fluxus and Company", Fluxus Reader, Ken Freidman, ed., West Sussex 1998, p. 240.
9. Ken Freidman, "A Transformative Vision of Fluxus", Ibid., p. ix.
10. Ken Freidman cites twelve ideas that were central to Fluxus: 1.Globalism 2.Unity of art and life 3. Intermedia 4.Experimentalism 5.Chance 6.Playfulness 7. Simplicity 8. Implicativeness 9 Examplativism 10. Specificity 11. Presence in time 12.Musicality , Ken Freidman, "Fluxus and Company", Ibid., p. 244ff.
11. In this context mention may be made of certain other elements that made the Fluxus movement so attractive among optimists. In a comparison between Fluxus and Dada Ken Freidman writes that "Dada was nihilistic, a millenarian movement in modernist terms. Fluxus was constructive. Fluxus was founded on principles of creation, of transformation and its central method sought new ways to build." Ken Freidman, "Fluxus and Company", Ibid., p. 243.
12. In an interview with Georges Maciunas, one of the founders of Fluxus, the Fluxus artist Larry Miller discussed the significance of site and situation-specific art and whether this can be called "concretism" or "functionalism". Larry Miller, "Transcript of the videotaped interview with George Maciunas, 24 March 1978", Ibid., p. 193.
13. Ken Freidman, "Fluxus and Company", Ibid., p. 239.
14. Jårg Geismar's interest in things that unite people does not mean that his art deals with or promotes an idea about universal values. He gives attention both to what is common to us – for example, eating, clothes, communication, sexuality – and how human life finds very different means of expressing itself, under the influence of different historical and cultural factors. The humanist tradition's "universal" ideal is a standpoint that – for very good reason – has long been the subject of serious criticism. From a feminist angle there has been criticism of the fact that the values and viewpoints of white, middle-aged heterosexual men have been raised to the status of a universal norm, thereby creating an ideological and actual repression of large groups of people. The queer perspective has further problematized the matter and has directed attention towards the exercise of power inherent in the establishment of heterosexuality as a norm (the so-called heterosexual matrix) and to the fact that the opposites of "man" and "woman" are much too generalized. (For an excellent presentation of the problem see: Tiina Rosenberg, Queerfeministisk agenda, Stockholm 2001, especially the chapters "Butlerism: genealogi och performativitet" and "Heterosexualiteter"). From a perspective that emphasizes the importance of post-colonial experience one can add to this criticism thoughts about whether the universal is primarily a projection of Western cultural norms and values. By their very divergence the others help to confirm one's own normality, not to say the natural order represented by one's own culture. (A good introduction to post-colonialism is to be found in the periodical Kairos's anthology Postkoloniala studier, Stockholm 2002.) Thanks to feminism, queer theory and the post-colonial perspective it is clearly evident today that the differences in people's circumstances and influence are entirely dependent on gender, sexuality, class, age and race and that universality is not an a-historical characteristic that is independent of such matters as power and dominance.
15. WE MEET IN:::, The Yamaguchi Prefectural Museum of Art and AIVA, Yamaguchi, Japan 2000, living, loving and doing, Gävle Konstcentrum, Gävle, Sweden, Henry Tayali Center, Lusaka, Zambia and Motomoto Museum, Mbala, Zambia 1999, Joint Venture, PS 1 Museum, New York, USA 1992, Touch Me Listen to Me, The Yamaguchi Prefectural Museum of Art, Yamaguchi, Japan 2000, We Came and We didn´t Leave, Konsthallen, Gothenburg, Sweden 1998, Dreams of Communication, Liljevalchs konsthall, Stockholm, Sverige 2002, To Whom it May Concern, Gallery Gabriele Rivet, Köln, Germany 1994, You, You and Me, workshop at the Higher Institute of Fine Arts, Antwerp, Belgium 1998, Dependencies on Distance, Tokyo, Japan 1990, If You Can´t Come in, Smile as You Go by, Ausstellungsraum Thomas Taubert, Düsseldorf, Germany 1994. A good example of Jårg Geismar's way of working and of how his ideas can be developed into an extended collaborative project is living, loving and doing. He produced two exhibitions within this framework, a seminar entitled Personal Experience versus On-Line Experience at the National Museum in Lusaka, and a cultural exchange in which, initially, artists from Zambia visited Gävle and Stockholm. These exchanges generated several different collaborative projects including that undertaken by Konstakuten, the co-operatively run gallery in Stockholm and artists from Zambia. A more extended and longer-term collaboration is that between Helen Karlsson, lecturer at Gävle Konstcentrum (with artists from Gävle) and Academy without walls, which was founded by the Zambian artist William Miko. An article on this project was published in DIK forum No. 2, Stockholm 2003. As regards the exhibitions, the first was a portrait of Gävle that was shown in Lusaka (and in a smaller version in Mbala) in Zambia while the other was a portrait of Lusaka which was shown at Gävle Konstcentrum. The exhibitions included photographs, videos, sound recordings, candles, textiles, fans and murals. The portrait of Gävle also included 10.000 boxes of Läkerol throat tablets – produced in the city since the end of the 19th century – which were handed out to visitors. The portrait of Lusaka included an official work of art in the form of a poster showing a photograph of a market in Lusaka. The poster was displayed in 50 light-boxes round Gävle while the exhibition was in progress.
16. One of Jårg Geismar's most common means of artistic expression is his drawings. Since the Renaissance, the drawing has been the basis of pictorial art. With its pregnant lines it appeals to the intellect and contributes to the search for perfection in the portrayal of nature. Sven-Olov Wallenstein has given an account of Vasari's (1511-74) theory of art in his essay "Kants gränslinje": "His theory of disegno (drawing, formation, but also "inner conception"), which allowed him to combine painting, sculpture and architecture, and which in an Academia del Disegno, requires the establishment of a common model in which we proceed from an inner mental conception (inner disegno, "idea") to a first materialization (outer disegno, "drawing"), and thereafter to the individual genre's particular form in order to be completed.", Bildstrider. Föreläsningar om estetisk teori, Göteborg 2001, p. 62f. (For the place of the drawing in classical art theory see, for example, Marta Edling, Om måleriet i den klassicistiska konstteorin, Stockholm 1999, the chapter "Idealisering och imitation: linje och färg"). In Geismar's case it is a very different aspect of drawing that gives it such a central role: intimacy. Drawing can be done using almost anything at all on almost any surface. One can write with a finger in the wet sand on the beach, scratch with a sharp object on a sheet of copper or, as Geismar has done on several occasions, use different colours of carbon paper for scratching images with keys or a pair of scissors – for example in the exhibition doing by hands looking by feet, Werkstadt Graz, Austria 2000. The pencil, or whatever material one uses, becomes an extension of the movements of hand and arm. Thus the drawing, more than most other media, represents a personal handwriting that lends the work a particular nearness. For Jårg Geismar, the drawn line also portrays the network of linking relationships that exists in the world between phenomena and people. His frequent use of electric cables and washing lines is a form of three-dimensional drawing in which the lines cross space and literally bind things together. Seen against the background of their original use, the electric cables become carriers of an energy that also has a metaphorical element and that expresses the force that is generated by the social network that his art so greatly depends upon. Jårg Geismar has made use of electric cables for more than 20 years and he maintains that they are the most important symbol in his art. With regard to drawing and the use of line, he frequently mentions Paul Klee and Eva Hesse as important influences. It is interesting to note that Klee taught at the Academy of Art in Düsseldorf in 1931-33 and that Eva Hesse visited the city on several occasions during the 1960s.
17. Svante Karlsson, "Jung v/s Buber", Hjärnstorm No. 54, Stockholm 1995.
18. Sartre developed his theory of the importance of the look or gaze in human relations – based on Hegel's "master-slave dialectic" – in L'Etre et le néant, Paris 1943: "I experience the other's gaze right into the heart of my action, as though my own possibilities had frozen and become alienated".
19. Margaret Pabst Battin, Ethical issues in suicide, New Jersey 1995. Chapter 4 "The Concept of Rational Suicide" is particularly apposite: "Is suicide, if it is rational in given circumstances, sometimes the rational choice or is it always merely a rational choice among others? Clearly when strategies other than suicide will equally well prevent harms, accomplish goals, or express a person´s deepest convictions, staying alive and using the other strategies will be at least an equally rational choice. But where other strategies will not succeed, suicide may be the only rational thing to do."
20. The preoccupation with death in the romantic world of ideas has been portrayed by Staffan Kling in his essay "Memento mori", Hjärnstorm Nos. 56-57, Stockholm 1996. In art, Arnold Böcklin's symbolistic "Die Toteninsel" is a paradigmatic example of how death can be expressed as both attractive and terrifying. Böcklin painted no less than five variants of the work between the years 1880-86 and reproductions of his isle of death spread in large editions throughout Europe towards the end of the nineteenth century. Franz Zelger, "En tavla att drömma om", Böcklin, Hans Henrik Brummer, ed., Stockholm 1993. The magnetic attraction of death is emphasized when it is coupled with the erotic as, for example, in Edvard Munch's works Vampire (1893-94) and Death of Marat II/The Murderess (1907). That the orgasm is often described as a "little death" obviously lends a certain sweetness to death itself. Andy Warhol's art has been a serious influence on Jårg Geismar, not least because of the fact that death was a prominent aspect of several works produced in the years 1962-65 including: 129 Die in Jet, Woman Suicide, Suicide (Silver Jumping Man), Suicide (Falling Man), Black and White Disaster, Ambulance Disaster, Twelve Electric Chairs and Atomic Bomb. These works are part of Warhol's series on the themes of death and accidents. In an interview from the early seventies Andy Warhol explained: "The Death series I painted was in two parts: the first part was about dead celebrities, the second about individuals no one had ever heard of. I thought people ought to think about them: the girl who jumped off the Empire State Building, the women who ate poisoned tuna fish, the car crash victims. I wasn´t sorry for them exactly, but people go on their way and they don´t really care if some stranger just got killed. So I thought it would be nice for those unknowns to be thought about by people who would never normally do that." Peter-Klaus Schuster, "Warhol and Goya", Warhol, Heiner Bastian, ed., London 2001, p. 55.
Our attention is also directed, in Jårg Geismar's Suicide Rooms, towards all the people – famous and unknown – who have taken their own lives for different reasons. The installations are a quiet homage to what is irrevocably lost: the uniqueness in each individual who dies.
21. Ironically, attempted suicide was punishable by death at certain times and it was still a criminal offence in England until 1961. (Battista, p. 88).
22. Anton J. L. van Hoff writes in From autothanasia to suicide. Self-killing in classical antiquity, London 1990, that "During the Late Republic and Early Empire committing suicide becomes something of a moral duty for the nobleman who loses face or the favour of the emperor. The ritual scenes are duly recorded by historians of that age.", p. 15. (Battista p. 88)
23. Joseph Beuys was appointed professor of sculpture at the Academy of Art in Düsseldorf in 1961 and he remained there until October 1972 when he was dismissed by the Minister of Science in the state of Nordrhein-Westfalen after he had led an occupation of the Academy's secretariat. This unusually dynamic period was portrayed in Stephan von Wieses article "Brännpunkt Düsseldorf - en krönika", Louise Robbert, ed., Brännpunkt Düsseldorf. Joseph Beuys och hans krets, Stockholm 1987. Beuys has given his views on the role of the professor: "perhaps a professor has no other function than that of the thread that one dips into a solution of sugar in order to make sugar candy: something organizes itself and crystallizes round it. The professor is nothing more than a student; there should be no distinction. He merely takes responsibility for continuity while students, in some cases, can come one day and disappear the next. At an academy a professor is, in a manner of speaking, a crystallization core and a principle of order." Ibid., p. 11. Numerous very gifted students attended Beuys's class, among them Jårg Immendorf, Blinky Palermo, Imi Knoebel and, to some extent, even Gerhard Richter. Right up to his death in 1986 Beuys was of great importance for the expansion of the concept of art, not least with regard to the relationship between art and life. Erik van der Heeg's article, "Beuys och transformationens geografi", Kris No. 39-40, Stockholm 1990, quotes part of an interview with Robert Filliou during which Beuys says that his actions "have always had importance for extending the old concept of art and making it as broad as possible and, if possible, so large that it includes all human activities.", p. 140. Classes at the Academy of Art in Düsseldorf are organized round a professor. During his trial year, which is differently organized, Jårg Geismar studied with professors Bernd Minich and Tony Craigg. Visiting professors included Kaspar König, Anthony Twaites and Nam June Paik. He then spent a year with Professor Fritz Schwegler and the ensuing five years in Professor Irmin Kamp's class. It was with her that Geismar took his Meisterschuler exam. Other teachers that were important to Geismar during his time as a student were: Tünn Konerdign (colour theory, basic artistic expression and history of art), Attila Kotany (philosophy), Walter Biemel (philosophy) and Werner Spiess (history of art). Even though Beuys was never Geismar's teacher, his ideas lived on at the Academy and were important on the art scene (not least in Düsseldorf). One point of contact between the two men is a great interest in food and art (food-art). As early as the 1960s Beuys, as well as other artists with Fluxus leanings like Daniel Spoerri, created works that related to food and eating. Ever since the exhibition Rice Cooking in Shingu in Japan in 1988 – at which Jårg Geismar offered visitors newly cooked rice – food and communal eating have played a central role in his activities. On some ten occasions he has organized his RESTAURANT MES AMIS at different places and, just as the title suggests, this is a "restaurant" for and with his friends. There is always a combination of cooking (often together), eating and conversation in something that be compared with the classical symposium. Everything takes place in an installation with a specially set table with such elements as cables, sound, light and smell effects and, sometimes, even poetry readings. In 1989 Jårg Geismar produced an exhibition with the title Rosemary that was concerned with electricity. The English title is both a girl's name and the name of a herb which, traditionally, symbolizes energy and vitality. Joseph Beuys also had a special relationship to rosemary. He used it, together with many other food products, in his work: fat, wine, tea, lemon, honey, herring, pork and others. Lucrezia De Domizio Durini, Joseph Beuys. The Art of Cooking, Milan 1999, p. 14f. With regard to the central matter of art and life which Beuys was so eager to resolve (for an initiated discussion see Sven-Olov Wallenstein, "Kants gränslinje", Bildstrider. Föreläsningar om estetisk teori, Gothenburg 2001), there is an important difference: even if Jårg Geismar works using an extended concept of art – and in a very concrete manner makes use of everyday events and experiences – he does not show a desire to combine life and art to the same degree as Beuys sought to do. In Geismar's case, the distinction is both interesting and important, even if, by means of his interactive and social projects, he clearly extends traditional limits.
24. Throughout Joseph Beuys's work there is a clear coupling to animals and nature. He was also one of the main figures behind The Greens in Germany at the beginning of the 1980s. In an article entitled "Beuys och transformationens geografi", Kris Nos. 39-40, Stockholm 1990, Erik van der Heeg considers Beuys's relationship with the animal world based on the famous Coyote action in New York in 1974: "The Coyote can be seen as an attempt on the part of Beuys to incorporate the New World's nature and mythical foundation into a metaphysical geography of its own. The wolfhound forms a hyper-hesperian pendant to the hare in the Old World. If the hare is seen as a nomadic creature of plains and lowlands, the embodiment of a principle of movement that exceeds and bridges the 'gap between east and west, Rome and Byzantium' and that 'finally becomes a synonym for Euroasian history', the encounter with the coyote marks a further step in the direction of a more global understanding of the forces that form our thoughts and societies.", p.137.
25. Private and Public, (lecture) Haifa Museum, Israel 1995, Clothes Make People, Sagacho Exhibit Space, Tokyo, Japan 1991, Cables, Gallery Gabriele Rivet, Cologne, Germany 1992, Art is no Fashion, Düsseldorf, Germany 1992, Public Copyright, Kunstverein, Düsseldorf, Germany 1994, Money, Money Come to Me, Avtosavodskaja Saal, Moscow, Russia 1991, Low Budget, Konstahalle zu Kiel, Kiel, Germany 1997 and Konsthallen, Gothenburg, Sweden 1998, and Peoples Exchange, 1. Biennale Tirana, Tirana, Albania 2001.
26. The philosophical movement is that of structuralism as formulated by Lévi-Strauss, Lacan, Althusser, Barth and Foucault – even though Foucault further developed the structuralist perspective to take into account not only the hidden/unconscious structures of or underlying a thought process but also the difference between thinking of different epochs and cultures. His discourse analysis introduces a more dynamic explanatory model which focuses on the production of the discourse and the fleeting nature of power. (For an introduction to structuralism and Foucault see: Svante Nordin, Filosofins historia. Det västerländska förnuftets äventyr från Thales till postmodernismen, Lund 1995, p. 529ff. For the re-orientation see: Michel Foucault, Diskursens ordning, Stockholm 1993 (1971).)
27. Lasse Ekstrand, Varje människa är en konstnär. Livskonstnären och samhällsvisionären Joseph Beuys, Gothenburg 1998, p. 8
28. True to the traditional logic of the news media, the focus, even with regard to the multicultural society, is on problems: in this case particularly criminality, unemployment, and clashes between cultures. Ylva Brune's study " 'Invandrare' i mediearkivets typgalleri", Maktens (o)lika förklädnader. Kön, klass och etnicitet i det postkoloniala Sverige, Paulina de los Reyes, Irene Molina, Diana Mulinari, eds., Stockholm 2002, shows, with the help of a couple of representative examples, how the media image of immigrants creates a range of stereotypes and generalisations from an individual case. The author writes: "But in relation to 'immigrants' the news reports shift from individual cases of deviance to assertions in which the deviance is made scientific and is generalized." (p. 177) Later in the article she reflects on the media's demonization of what is foreign: "What utility value has the news reporter's constant repetition and aggressive portrayal of 'the young immigrant's' and the 'adult male immigrant's' physical attacks on the ideals of sexual equality? From our welfare-state optimism we can see the news stories as warning examples that should make us all reflect – in the way that I believe the texts on isolated immigrant women might function. But in the case of contemporary media events in which (immigrant) boys and men are problematized, there is also a dimension beyond the peaceful sphere of popular fostering; a hateful, xenophobic demonization and anguished demands for disciplinary action against the demons created by their own stories.", p. 180
29. Ragnar Thoursie, "Sundbybergs-prologen", Nya sidor och dagsljus, Stockholm 1952
30. There are two works in the exhibition that relate to the matter of public space. There is The Optimists, which consists of silhouettes of monumental figures painted directly onto the wall in the first, monumental gallery at Liljevalchs (originally intended as a sculpture hall) which, architecturally, has something of the character of a square. And there is Be My Guest, which is both the title of the room and the main heading for the events which take place there. The walls of the room have been papered with pages from newspapers from different countries and this acts as a reminder that this is a part of the public space that is constituted by the media – here represented by a form that is both old and, on account of its non-linear structure, is also to some degree like the new Internet-based media. The backdrop of newspapers helps to emphasize the dimension of time: what takes place in Be My Guest – conversations, lectures and the various happenings – takes place in a present while the news is already history. The two works are the result of an express desire to step forth into the public space, but also both to comment on it and contribute to its existence. Taken together, The Optimists and Be My Guest give a "picture" of a public dimension in a state of transformation where the classical agora is only a part of (and one of many metaphors for) the public space today. (A consideration of art and the public space that is as initiated as it is accessible can be found in Sven-Olov Wallenstein, Bildstrider. Föreläsningar om estetisk teori, Gothenburg 2001, chap. "Verk, plats, rum").
Literature
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