I will not examine other aspects of Kiefer’s art, such as more recent political, philosophical and scientific allegories often found in his later works, which are too numerous and rich in detail to cover in this short essay. I will however, discuss the significance of his changing use of materials, his notions towards materiality, and the position with respect to some other influences within contemporary art that Kiefer’s work has been able to either complement, or challenge during the last 50 years.
Footnote; this essay was written to coincide with Anselm Kiefer’s 70th Birthday on 8th March 2015. Also noting the death of Adolph Hitler, 30th April 1945 (highly significant in the culture that forms much of Kiefer’s early commentary, and coincidentally, the final submission date for this essay).
Anselm Kiefer, Born 1945 -
Anselm Kiefer was born into the turmoil of history, at the close of World War II, shortly before the suicide of Adolf Hitler. After the war, the ‘sense of an overwhelming guilt’ on the remaining German nation, struggling to come to terms with the destruction and devastation caused by the Third Reich, has been suggested as a nation going through the processes of grief, a subject well written about by many, e.g. (Arrase, 2001), (Arnds, 2002) (Lauterwein, 2007) and compared with clinical grief (Worden, 2010 (4th Edition)) and emotional transition e.g. (Bridges, 2009 (3rd Edition)). The initial emotion was anger, (e.g. the Nuremburg trials, 1945-46) then, a sort of denial (a ‘reality’ in terms of a sort of ‘state forced’ disbelief), through the 1950s and 60s when Anselm Kiefer was maturing into early adulthood."Multiple ways of interpreting experiences are available to each of us through interacting with others, and that it is the meaning of our experiences that constitutes reality. Reality, consequently, is 'socially constructed'" (Bogdan & Biklen, 2002 (4th Edition)).It could be suggested that the next grief process, of ‘acceptance’ became a huge and possibly subliminal, motivator for Kiefer. Having originally studied Law then Romantic Literature, he then switched to Art, seemingly in order to express it. (Finger & Weidemann, 2011).
Anselm Kiefer’s early career was immersed within a newly established democratic German society, albeit, still undergoing considerable turmoil. The division of East Germany (Soviet controlled Germany Democratic Republic) from West Germany (The Federal Republic of Germany, initially controlled by the Western Allies) and subsequent partition of Berlin. Later, a rising undercurrent of political unrest in GDR spreading to FDR which was (after 15+ years of economic growth in the GDR, known as Wirtschaftswunder, or “economic miracle”) (Barkin, 2015), born from the idealism of re-settled East Germans who had crossed over to the west. This also marked the start of escalation of the cold war between the Americans and Soviets, and later stirred up anti-war sentiments of the younger generations, especially against American involvement in Vietnam throughout the 1960s and early 1970s.
Within this context, Kiefer, began painting in the Neo-Expressionist style, exhibiting together with George Baselitz; both major contributors of the movement of the 1970s. By artistically ‘replaying’ the German war histories during and after graduation, depicting himself in poses from older German art compositions (e.g. Fig 1, Caspar David Friedrich’s ‘Wanderer above a Sea of Fog’, 1818), and then photographing or painting them whilst making a ‘Nazi’ salute (e.g. ‘Occupations’, Kiefer, 1969), - he set his mark of recognition.
This symbolic gesture was extremely provocative, in fact, legally forbidden by the governing allies, within the German Democratic and Federal Republics. Although a calculated yet courageous risk, Kiefer was not alone in trying to shock the people of Germany into recognizing that the atrocities of the war could no longer be ‘forcefully’ subdued. I believe this in itself deserves generous recognition.
Contemporary writers also influenced Kiefer, particularly those like Heinrich Böll, Paul Celan and others providing a sometimes humorous yet uncomfortable literary truth telling (e.g. Günter Grass (The Tin Drum -1959) about the dark years in Germany’s history.
Kiefer continued to create works of deeply sensitive and intellectual meaning, usually referring to German history, both recent (war) and ancient (myth). (Lauterwein, 2007). In many paintings, he also included a line or more of text, and (perhaps in sympathetic reference to the “new” literal trends of the late 1960s American peers, particularly like Joseph Kosuth) yet in contrast to Kosuth’s rejection of the painted image in art, or the notion of art as idea, as idea, Kiefer maintains the narrative quality of subtly composed images.
Other early works, such as ‘Siegfried forgets Brünhilde’ (1973, 1975), depicting snow covered fields which had been recently ploughed, with converging furrows up to the distant horizon, also became a regular theme. The use of a limited colour pallet of blues browns and whites, to create images of barren flat land with distant forests, which are not unlike the fields and forests found in the desolate areas that the Nazis used to locate Auschwitz and Belsen, two of the most notorious death camps of the holocaust. Kiefer uses a reference, but neither direct, nor obvious. Together with careful choice of titles, this is a cunning and clever device, with far more meaning packed in than first viewed…
The Siegfried and Brünhilde myth came from ancient Norse (Northern German) history, which Richard Wagner used as the basis for his opera, the Ring cycle. This, together with its mythical narrative was a favourite reference of the Nazi party. Military operations that the Nazis planned during the Second World War were so named after its mythical sovereignty and importance.
Kiefer chose similar titles with reference to those Norse legends and went on to appropriate names of mythical characters (from the Nibelung), (Lauterwein, 2007) (p71-72).
He weaved new manifestations of history, through reference to the Nazi operations but also to remind viewers of the grotesque destruction & human violation, (e.g. Fig 6 & 7), through regularly repeating the image of long flat landscapes with ploughed furrowed fields that induce a sense of cold isolation and abandonment.
Furthermore, these compositions of fields and ploughed earth are also linked to Hitler’s deep belief that the ‘true’ Germans (of Norse myth) came from the soil itself, the Blut und Boden (blood and soil) were conjoined in the Nazi propaganda around heritage (descent) in the blood, and land (or territory) in the soil. (Brassley & Segers, 2012)
Almost all of his early works were painted with oil on canvas, or oil on burlap during 1975 to 1976.
In 1980, Kiefer was chosen together with George Baselitz, to represent the Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany), at the 39th Venice Biennale. This was a crucial recognition of Kiefer’s work in its importance to Neo Expressionism (the theme was a reflection of Art of ‘70s), and also took into account the Kiefer and Baselitz links to the Fauvist (Wild Beasts) movement, (who’d been trying to break down the barriers of silence for acceptance of the [& denial of] the Holocaust, the Third Reich and World War II). This stirred condemnation in many Germans critics, yet huge admiration and acknowledgement in Americans of Kiefer’s courage in referencing the memories of Nazism, German mythology (which had also been banned from being taught in German schools) and by using his own image, which as he put it, was ‘To re-enact what they did just a little bit in order to understand the madness’. (Arrase, 2001), (From an interview published in June 1980 in Art: Das Kunstmagazin (Wiesbaden) cited in Rosenthal 1987:17).
In these exhibited representational works of composition, using oil on canvas or burlap, or with photography, together with acrylics and emulsion and other new mediums, it set Kiefer apart from his peers. In my humble opinion he showed great intellectual determination not to be swayed by artistic vogue or fashions of the time. He was then chosen to display work in New York in 1981, at the Marian Goodman Gallery and his path to international success was set…
Moving on to works post 1981, it could be suggested that Kiefer’s maturing sense of materiality and its importance in painting develops. It may have been sown and germinated by the work of Joseph Beuys, and documented by Donald Judd who noticed the merging of Sculpture with Painting in the early 1960s (Rowley, 2015). Furthermore, the size & scale of works increased dramatically as Kiefer started to use more alternative media including lead, human hair, straw, ashes, and shellac. Later still, steel, dead sunflowers, with seeds and other vegetation are introduced. He’s continued this stylistic symbolism derived from materials, often using literature as a form of reference; sometimes using his own earlier works (in a sense, re-appropriated); and a limited colour pallet based on earth hues & tones and ‘earthy’ elements.
Figure 8, 'Black Flakes', (2006) Kiefer, A.
Privatbesitz Familie Grothe. Photo Privatbesitz Famille Grothe. © Anselm Kiefer
All materials used by Kiefer hold within them unique qualities that are much deeper than initial metaphors. Their physicality, - say in the sheets of lead used as book pages, allude to the heavy burden of sorrow and guilt; and are physically heavy ancient relics from inner earth. Lead was used as a malleable and safe container for the transport of gases (as well as water), drawing upon the inference to the gas chambers of the Nazi “final solution”. The use of ashes not only allude to the ashes of the dead, but also a temporal significance of earth and are the remains of utter destruction. Ashes are the absolute aftermath of everything that once existed in an organic form. The use of dead sunflowers and seeds, allude to the temporal potential for rebirth from, and return to, the earth, and yet also when sown within the barren and infertile medium, lead one to question ‘what could have been’. Straw (the golden sun dried by-product of wheat, for bread) alludes to the hair of Brünhilde, the Norse maiden, born from the soil.
My own recent works have been hugely influenced by dramatic earth colours that Anselm Kiefer continues to incorporate. This limited pallet instils a sense of the mundane, even drudgery, which I find of interest, especially when my intent is to suggest the notion of the quotidian in my compositions.
I have also started to use mixtures of traditional painting materials (i.e. acrylic pigments) with laundry fluff and domestic detritus (Fig. 9), - symbolic references to what humans leave behind in their existence, usually without intention or concern. This transfer, of a kind of signature from each individual, has only within the last 20 years been recognised as important, like the minute quantity of oils left by a fingerprint, or even more recently, the DNA traces used for forensic evidence.
Summary & Conclusions
History itself is a material to Kiefer. It can be sculptured and reformed, - humans can re-write history to make it better or worse, depending on their intent. This is how it was in post war Germany. Kiefer’s determination that this forbidden history be re-visited through Art, not to re-write it, but to re-emphasise it through subtle and spiritual notions of the dreadful mistakes of his parents’ generation and before, is un-equalled. For this, I submit that he is one if not the most important key contributors to society, as well as contemporary art over the last 50 years.His selection & use of materials holds both accurate and allegorical symbolic and spiritual meanings, often with multiple linkages to historical (both recent and ancient), physical and theoretical significance. These are not immediate or didactic but subtly emerge over repeated revisiting and re-studying of his art. This takes his truly unique and immense intellectual knowledge to deliver. Kiefer presents a palimpsest of handed down experiences, often re-worked or re-appropriated through earlier works of his own. It is through this layering that I totally engage with Kiefer’s views of history itself being a plastic and malleable material. The depth of his research, the skill of his ability to truly engage the viewer into a journey of curiosity and his continued unwavering zeal and tenacity, in my humble opinion, make him a true “living master”.
Finally, Kiefer has been recognised as possibly the world’s greatest living artist, and in 2008 received the German Book Trade Peace Prize, an amazing accolade as the first Artist to receive such an award. I’m sure Günter Grass (who shared similar views, writing about the guilt and shame of the German post war nation, and whom was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1999), no doubt influenced the younger Anselm.
Günter Grass would also be beating his own drum for Anselm Kiefer.
(As a sad footnote, whilst writing this essay, I learned the news of the death of Günter Grass, who passed away peacefully on 12 April 2015, aged 87).
(Word count; < 2000, excl. Bibliography, titles & referencing).
Bibliography
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- Arrase, D. (2001). Anselm Kiefer. London: Thames & Hudson Ltd.
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