Art-O-Gram: concept artist and the importance of concept art

The term concept art appears wherever art is about, and quite a few of the best -known artists of our time are concept artists. And yet it is not an art that can be approached quickly and easily, as in the "Art-O-Gramm: What is conceptual art?" was mentally torn.

A look at some well -known concept artists and their works is very suitable for indicating the diversity of concept art and to convey an idea of ​​how much fun this art movement can bring:

Concept art as the art of diversity

Marcel Duchamp is seen as her co-founder, especially because he introduced the first ready-made into art, the "Roue de Bicyclette" (a bicycle tire installed on a stool). A ready-made is a everyday object that is not created by the artist, but only and without any aesthetic prejudice to the artwork.

Duchamp came up with the idea when he admired the technical innovations at the Aviation show in Paris in 1912 and then said to his artist friend Constantin Brâncuși:

"Painting is in the end. Who can do something better than this propeller? You?".

He then gave up painting and grabbed the bicycle tire. In 1914 the ready-made "bottle dryer" , a commodity manufactured in mass production, which only got its importance through Duchamp's selection to the art object, through its Duchamp's gesture of signing, and the time of this gesture has been celebrated as the birth of conceptual art since then.

The famous concept artist Bruce Nauman works with a wide variety of materials, photographs and installations, sculptures and neon art and videos. He is primarily concerned with irritating human sensory perception and also gladly shocking if he z. B. an opera singer on the screen around your own axis, which intonates as well as desperately and desperately a disturbing consultation: "Feed Me / Eat Me / Anthropology" and "Help Me / Hurt Me / Sociology" - "Fun me / eat me / anthropology" and "Help me / hurt me / sociology" (video installation "Anthro / Socio - Rind Spinning" , played on several screens on Documenta IX in 1992 and with one -way sound tracks).

The word inventor of concept art, sol lewitt , prefers to create spaces, either by building sculptures that fit into a landscape like natural and yet surprising parts, such as B. the "Black Form Dedicated to the Missing Jews" , a black cuboid in front of the bright white town hall of Hamburg Altona. Or by painting a wall so that it looks like a sculpture, or both at the same time, and often Lewitt also performs his work in series, using a wide variety of media: drawings and watercolors, wall drawings and murals, sculptures, prints and books.

Also one of the prominent concept artists is Lawrence Weiner , who also had to contribute something, namely the Declaration of Intent from 1968 , in which he summarizes the principles of the KK as follows: the artist can produce the work himself, but it can also be made by helpers or does not need to be carried out at all, all of this is equivalent to realize the concept; As actually proceed, the circumstances depend on the circumstances.

Since then, Weiner has written artist books with other theoretical articles on conceptual art , presented written works of art to present his text work in a wide variety of forms, which he describes as sculptures , created many wall installations and many other concept art works, as video art or as a film, as audio recording or performance, as a poster, multiple or graphic. Weiner does not like inequality, which is always expressed in his works of art, in general the "sculptor of language" is most importantly the (critical) word, without language it is not possible in his opinion.

The Chinese concept artist Ai Weiwei is much more politically motivated, he criticizes human rights violations, pollution and economic exploitation in his works of art, which have been the order of the day in China since the country's economic opening. He processes artistic traditions of his homeland, but also dauca -based ideas in his installations and photographs, pictures, books, sculptures, films and houses.

The American Eugenia Perpetua Butler, , had only dealt with shamanism almost for almost a decade after studying art before she found a conceptual way that she was represented at many important exhibitions in the beginnings of conceptual art and from there started a long career, with simple and yet mysteriously interesting works of art with the help of which you can do the fineness of human perception and Raum-time relationships questioned. That was her plan, butler wanted to provoke thoughtfulness and discussions with her art.

The American concept artist John Baldessari also works a lot with language and places them in a wide variety of relationships with standing and ongoing images, in photo works, collages, cut-ups and video formances. His favorite topic are the media and their mechanisms, its motto, never bored to a viewer.

Nam June Paik, born in South Korea, is the concept artist of video and media art, but also created such incredibly funny sculpture as the "Pre-Bell-Man", which stands in front of the Museum of Communication in Frankfurt am Main.

The German concept artist Cosima from Bonin likes to work with textiles, but has also presented films and installations and works of art that deal with society and social relationships. She also works with musicians, with interactions between the respective art products.

The American concept artist Dan Graham, in turn, prefers and kidnaps his audience, into eventful and yet small, walk -in works of art of the size of a pavilion that can now be found all over the world and in which the sense of perception are spoken in a surprising way.

Joseph Beuys also one of the concept artists, and in addition to the works that he presented as a sculptor, draftsman and action artist, Beuys dealt with humanism, social philosophy and anthroposophy.

Typical concept art: further interpretation freedom

Beuys shows very well how difficult this art form can be understood because this understanding requires that the recipient really deals with the background of the work of art and the concept artist. Overall, the above overview also leads to the perhaps rather easier knowledge that classification is actually not very possible.

This means that all those "to the clause" that can live without the "classification of art" - in conversely, one can also say: a classification is not necessary at all, concept art can be viewed very well without prior theoretical superstructure.

But one thing is also quite clear on this small tour through this type of art: "what the artist wants to tell us" is worthwhile in any case, and conceptual art is very often an indigestive, exciting and stimulating art, in which the subsequent occupation with the artist can bring further surprising findings.

The importance of concept art

In order to grasp their importance in the overall field of art, it is related to art that is assigned to other art styles. There are many of these art styles, at least three -digit numbers from art styles from Aeropittura to Zacken style are distinguished in art science.

If we want to assess the success of concept art throughout the world of art, one could e.g. B. Questions as to the importance of concept artists within the world -famous and economically successful artists who (from all art styles) appear in the international rankings, e.g. B. in the list of artfacts.net with the 500 most successful artists in the world.

Concept artists who are so well known that they appear in international media are around 250 to 300 in the world. 65 artists of these are represented in the artist list of art facts, i.e. around a quarter. This high proportion of concept artists in the "World bestseller list of art" compared to all artists working in other artificial styles speaks for an above -average success.

If you take a closer look at the list of the 500 best, there is an astonishing result: the proportion of concept artists among the 200 best paid artists in the world is almost 20 percent, but only a little over 10 percent. At least financially, the "conceptual art for your own home" more like something for the hard -rich in this world, and it would probably remain to be examined how many of these conceptual works of art served as speculative objects.

It is only a good thing that there is not so much art of this kind for your own home anyway, and a lot of works of art by concept artists can be viewed in public spaces, i.e. free of charge for everyone ...

Famous works of art and examples of concept art