DREAM FORMS [TRAUMGEBILDE]
MAIL-ART-Exhibition
Curators: Thomas Westermann and Wolfgang Schneider
on January 26, 1986 (pdf in German)
GALLERY IM FLUR | Kulturhaus Ernst Thälmann
Erich-Weinert-Str. 27 | 39104 Magdeburg (GDR)
January 6 to February 24, 1986
TAGGED: ►GDR State-security report
Invitationcard
+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
ARTISTS IN THE SHOW
ARGENTINA: Edgardo-Antonio Vigo, La Plata.
AUSTRIA: Franz-Milan Wirth, Wien; Herbert Kerchbaum, Wien; Martin Krist, Stockerau; Viktor Rogy, Klagenfurt.
BELGIUM: An-Atomic, Eugies; Club Moral, Antwerpen; Dirk van Severen, Meulebeke; Guy Bleus, Wellen; Luc Fierens, Hombeek; Piotr Aakoun, c/o Peter Moreels; Rudi Wilderjans, Borgloon.
BRASIL: Lucio Kume, Sáo Paulo.
CANADA: Jupitter-Larsen, Vancouver.
CSSR: Eva Vlasáková, Želesný Brod; Gabriel Tanuska, Puchov; Pavel Rudolf, Brno.
DENMARK: Mogens Otto Nielsen, Hjallerup; Schmidt-Olsen, Hjørring, Steen Krarup, Copenhagen; Plagiat, Steen Møller Rasmussen, Valby.
ENGLAND: A.1. Waste Paper Co. Ltd., London; David George, Bristol; David J. Bell, Derby; Jilly Jargon, Faversham/Kent; Keith Bates, Manchester; Lizzie de Bechi, Bristol; Mark Pawson, Cheshire; Robin Crozier, Sunderland; Roger Radio, Faversham/Kent; Routine Art Co., London.
FRANCE: J. Rabascall, Paris; Jacques Massa, Paris; Lucien Suel, Berguette; Michel et Valentine Collet, Lure; Pascal Lenoir, Andeville; Paul Lamontellerie, Tresses; Philippe Laurent, Blois; Pierre Marquer, Salernes; Sara Joyce, Isbergues.
GERMANY/DDR: Andrea Barthold, Karl-Marx-Stadt — Chemnitz; Andrea Hammerbacher, Suhl; Andrea Minkwitz, Dresden; Bernd Hiepe, Erfurt; Bernd-Lutz Lange, Leipzig; Birger Jesch, Volkmannsdorf; Bogomil J. Helm, Berlin; Christian Lang, Karl-Marx-Stadt — Chemnitz; Christine Rosenbaum, Oberlungwitz; Claudia Westermann, Magdeburg; Claus Bach, Weimar; Detlef Kappis, Berlin; Dietrich Buhrow, Greifswald; Eric S. Linge, Magdeburg; Frank Herrmann, Dresden; Franziska Schneider, Magdeburg; Friedrich Winnes, Berlin; Georg Felsmann, Karl-Marx-Stadt — Chemnitz; Gerda Dassing, Groß Roge; Guillermo Deisler, Halle/S.; Hans-Jürgen Heß, Schwarzenberg; Henri Winter, Magdeburg; Ingo Hetsch, Schönebeck; Jens Berek, Magdeburg; Joachim Schütte, Magdeburg; Joachim Stange, Dresden; Jörg Sonntag, Dresden; Joseph W. Huber, Berlin; Jürgen Schieferdecker, Dresden; Jürgen Schneider, Magdeburg; Jürgen Schöberl, Karl-Marx-Stadt — Chemnitz; Karla Sachse, Berlin; Karsten Matthes, Rochsburg; Knut Hartwich, Sellin; Lutz Wohlrab, Berlin; Manfred Butzmann, Berlin; Manfred Martin, Leipzig; Martin Bernhardt; Rainer Löhr, Magdeburg; Rainer Schrock, Magdeburg; Rambo Gerlach, Erfurt; Renate Oelert, Bergen; Robert Rehfeldt, Berlin; Roland Beier, Neubrandenburg; Roland Mühler, Magdeburg; Ruth Adolphi, Halle/S.; Ruth Wolf-Rehfeldt, Berlin; Sal-Gerd Beyer, Berlin; Siegfried Otto, Hermsdorf; Silke Krambeck, Stralsund; Steffen Jacob, Karl-Marx-Stadt — Chemnitz; Thomas Fleischhauer, Magdeburg; Thomas Westermann, Magdeburg; Torsten Linz, Leipzig; Ute Ortag, Karl-Marx-Stadt — Chemnitz; Volker Beyer, Falkenau; Walter G. Goes, Bergen; Wolfgang Lehmann, Zwickau; Wolfgang Schneider, Magdeburg.
GERMANY (BRD): Achim Schnyder, Kassel; Albrecht/d., Stuttgart; Aloys Ohlmann, Baltersweiler; AnthroArt, Berlin; Arno Bojahr, Hannover; Barbara Seifried, Köngen; Bernd Olbrich, Kassel; christoph machArt, Bochum; Dietmar Kirves, Berlin; Endre Tót, Köln; Franz-Josef Weber, Siegen; Frieder Kerler, Göppingen; Géza Perneczky, Köln; Graf Haufen, Berlin; Henning Mittendorf, Frankfurt/a.M.; Joki Mail Art, Minden; Jürgen Kierspel, Stuttgart; Jürgen O. Olbrich, Kassel; Jürgen Prusas, Hannover; Karl Riha, Siegen; Klaus Reichling, Sonsbeck; Marianne Seifried, Ludwigsburg; Ona Nuk, Berlin; Ouart, Berlin; Roland Szefferski, Berlin; Siglinde Kallnbach, Kleinsassen; Thomas Nägele, Göppingen; Ulrich Kattenstroh, Berlin; Uwe Hamm-Fürhölter, Aidlingen; Werner Elbrecht, Bochum; Wolfgang Hainke, Ganderkesee.
GREECE: Vlasis Rassias, Athen.
HELVETIA: H. R. Fricker, Trogen.
HOLLAND: Avoc Artdesign, Jan W. Vugts, Tilburg; Basis Orguna, Amsterdam; Holly Moors, Haren; Jan Verschoore, Oostburg; Ko de Jonge, Middelburg; Leidi Haaije, Maastricht, Rod Summers, Maastricht; Ruud Janssen, Tilburg; Stichting Limbabwe, Venlo; Theodoor Stampy; Willy Scholte, Amsterdam.
HUNGARY: Károly Elekes, Budapest; Lengyel András, Budapest.
ITALY: Arnaldo Esposto, Genova; Emilio Morandi, Bergamo; Fanna Roncoroni, Villorba; Gaetano Colonna, Sorrento; Jean-Paul Morelle, Verona; Last Exit, Antonio Tregnaghi, Lucca; Nicola Frangione, Monza; Roberto Zito, Roma; Sara, c/o Sani, Cernusco; Ubaldo Giacomucci, Pescara; Vittore Baroni, Forte dei Marmi; Vittorio Baccelli, Lucca.
JAPAN: Shozo Shimamoto, Hyogo).
N. IRLAND: Ben Allen;
POLAND: Andrzej Dudek-Dürer, Wroclaw; Pawel Petasz, Elblag; Piotr Rogalski, Piotrkow; Stacho Klonowski, Lublin.
ROMANIA: Andrei Oisteanu, Bucharest; Dan Mihăltianu, Bucharest; Mircea Florian, Bucharest. SPAIN: Rafael Flores, Andujar-Jean; Xoan Anleo, Pontevedra.
SWEDEN: Bengt Adlen, Malmö; Lars Vilks, Arild.
URUGUAY: Clemente Padin, Montevideo.
USA: Abracadada Rubber Stamp Co., San Fransisco; Bill Chambers, Lawrenceville; Bob Kirkman, Chico; Carlo Pittore, New York; Darlene Altschul, Tarzana; David Cole; Des McLean, Glassboro; Dolores Doroff, Minneapolis; Gary Gach, San Francisco; Jeff Mullican, Los Angeles; Joachim Frank, Albany; John Evans; New York; John Held jr., Dallas; Katherine & Alexander Hirka, New York; Midnight, New Orleans, Patrick T., Berkeley; Private World, San Francisco; Radio Dream DADA, Santa Rosa; Robert Ashworth, Bellingham; Rockola, San Francisco; Steinlicht, Minneapolis; The Spitter, John M. Bennett, Columbus; Xelda-RADIOFREEDADA, Los Angeles; Zir Zan, c/o Zan Hoffman, Des Moines.
VENEZUELA: Carlos Zerpa, Valencia.
YUGOSLAVIA: Andrej Tišma, Novi Sad; Nenad Bogdanovic, Odzaci; Pop D. Djurdjev, Novi Sad.
+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
State Security Service Report
by Werner Weber O.U. Jan 26, 1986Subject: WESTERMANN, Thomas - SCHNEIDER, Wolfgang, both Magdeburg "tRAUMgeBILDe" - "Mail Art-Project No. 1" Materials of the planned 11. Exhibition of the GALERIE IM FLUR of the Kulturhaus "Ernst Thälmann", Magdeburg, January/February 1986. After reviewing the two folders handed over to me by comrade H., containing approx. 400 mails sent to the private addresses of the citizens WESTERMANN, Thomas and SCHNEIDER, Wolfgang
After reviewing the two file folders handed over to me by comrade H. with approx. 400 documents sent by mail to the private addresses of the citizens WESTERMANN, Thomas and SCHNEIDER, Wolfgang ... ... ... with works of the so-called "Mail Art" from senders from the GDR, a few socialist countries as well as from the FRG/Berlin-West and numerous states of the capitalist foreign countries, predominantly member countries of the NATO, I give below according to order a first evaluation of the materials: All the documents on which the assessment is based, - the invitations in German and English sent to the potential participants in the "Project", - the presumed mode of invitation to be read from the submissions made, - the wording and design of the draft invitation to the exhibition opening, - the form and content of the majority of the works received, - the principle of order (and obviously not intended selection) as well as the commentary on the works by WESTERMANN and SCHNEIDER (to be read from the typewritten signatures) lead to the compelling conclusion that the two organizers did not intend to make a cultural and art-political contribution with their action and the intended exhibition as an enrichment of the cultural life of the district city of Magdeburg in the year of the XIth Party Congress of the SED. Party Congress of the SED, the 100th birthday of Ernst Thälmann, the patron saint of their sponsoring cultural house, as well as before the 21st Workers' Festival of the GDR. All the documents rather give rise to the suspicion that the initiators wanted to use their "Mail Art Project" to develop a kind of cultural, artistic and contact-political "alternative" to the efforts of the party and the state in the GDR to develop a partisan, people-oriented socialist-realist art and the ever-stronger integration with the socialist brother countries.
Eine solche Tendenz fällt bereits bei einem statistischen Überblick über die Einsendungen ins Auge:
Neben dem naturgemäß großen Anteil von Einsendungen aus der DDR mit etwa 110 ist die CSSR mit 6, die UVR mit 4, die VRP mit 2 und die SRR mit 2Beiträgen vertreten.
Such a tendency is already apparent in a statistical overview of the entries:
In addition to the naturally large proportion of entries from the GDR with about 110, the CSSR is represented with 6, the UVR with 4, the VRP with 2 and the SRR with 2 contributions.
If one adds the 4 entries from the SFRY, the socialist countries are represented with 18 works, with the GDR together with 128 works.
In contrast, there are 185 entries from capitalist countries, 173 of them from NATO countries, 68 works from the FRG and Berlin-W. Apart from the clearly "eager" use of all English-language terms by WESTERMANN and SCHNEIDER, their definitions for the emergence of "Mail Art" as well as their explanation of their own intentions on the draft of the invitation are a clear indication that they are mainly interested in form, that they do not possess a conception of content, and that they unconsciously or rather consciously try to avoid it. According to both, "Mail Art" is first and foremost communication, exchange of ideas, postal dialog, transmission of information between artists, also to overcome their isolation. Not a word about the fact that "Mail Art" has internationally become an essential artistic medium for the dissemination of political demands, mainly progressive, humanistic ones, but is also already used by reactive forces.
No word that "Mail Art" plays a role in the struggle against the nuclear missile armament of NATO, against racism in South Africa, against the interference of US imperialism in Latin America, that typical actions of the children and youth of the GDR for the liberation of Angela DAVIS, Luis CORVALAN, Nelson MANDELA by mass postcard actions were in large parts original "Mail Art" actions.
Even a superficial overview of the works of senders from the GDR makes it clear that the majority of these (amateur and professional) artists do not stand aesthetically on the ground of socialist realism and politically-ideologically on the positions of real existing socialism. Apart from a few real "gimmicks", open or hidden criticism of environmental protection, alleged loneliness and isolation, bureaucracy, state "paternalism", general pacifist peace chapels and warnings, skepticism or abstract form gimmicks with a tendency to dissolution (incidentally also in WESTERMANN and SCHNEIDER themselves) dominate. There can be no question of art for socialism.
In the works of the foreign senders, all shades of form and content are represented. It goes from the "disciples of Onan" presumably homosexuals, over a glorification of the FRG-revanchism (by WESTERMANN and SCHNEIDER erroneously ?? for the opposite), kitsch, pornography, commercial products up to clearly social-critical arguments with the ordinary capitalism as well as denunciations against racism and imperialist peace endangerment. It is not clear from the documents whether WESTERMANN and SCHNEIDER were willing and able to select the works and present the politically relevant statements in such a way that their class- and system-relevant definiteness would have been expressed unambiguously to the GDR viewer.
According to the state of affairs, rather the opposite is to be assumed, that the GDR observer would have to relate the statements to his socialist environment and possibly should.
It is striking in the typewritten comments of the two organizers that often the term "gimmick" is supposed to signal a thematic and content-related irrelevance, where the intended statement becomes roughly clear. Whether incompetence, frivolity or intention prevail here cannot be clearly decided. Here are a few typical examples:
1. in the SCHNEIDER folder, under No. 8, a submission by LANGE, Bernd-Lutz, 7030 Leipzig is described as a "gimmick". The r o t e grid pasted over the given photograph of the room is hardly meant as a "gimmick".
2. similar applies to the "verrammelten Raum" of SONNTAG, Jörg, 8019 Dresden, (SCHN./18)
3. the work "The way of Zen" by ROGALSKI, Piot, SKR Poclt. 99, 97-300 Piotrkow TRYB. VR Poland (SCHN./57) is described as "criticism of religion (+ sects)", but is probably rather meant to propagate "Zen" as a way out of narrowness into the light; the sender, after all, calls for participation in a "Project" under the motto "The Four-Dimensional Man".
4 The grid motif also appears in the work of HEß, Hans-Jürgen, 9430 Schwarzenberg (SCHN./73), but is also classified as a "gimmick".
5. fear" - a nightmare in red (loneliness) is what WESTERMANN and SCHNEIDER call the work of HIEPE, Bernd, 5061 Erfurt. The back of the card is pasted over, underneath, next to the address of the author, the real title appears: "Im T/Roten Raum" (!)
In the WESTERMANN folder, under the heading "drücke der zukunft deinen stempel auf" (suggestion for active engagement), a card is filed that was posted at the railroad post office 1005 Berlin of the GDR capital. It contains, among other things, a postmark with the following text: BIMA-MEET - BRD DDR - Klaus Groh Robert Reha - Augustfehn - 24.2.85. On the address page, which is signed "Herzhaft R.R..." and also contains the remark: "Never can stop your ideas!" (No one can stop your ideas!), the stamp impression of the outline of a cow is reproduced, with names of persons of various national origins, probably members of an international (artist?, mail art?) grouping, in place of the designation of the individual cuts of meat. Again, the recipients WESTERMANN and SCHNEIDER apparently found nothing remarkable.
7 The card from KIRVES, Dietmar, D-1000 Berlin (-West) 61, placed next to it, obviously contains a criticism of the sender about the motto of the exhibition. Different is the hand painted over it and the play on words with the exhibition motto
DREAMS ARE NOT ROOMS
SPACES ARE NOT DREAMS
DREAMS ARE NARROW SPACES
can hardly be interpreted. WESTERMANN and SCHNEIDER turn it into "Social Critique of Constrictions (BRD)".Evaluation:
The "Mail-Art" exhibition "tRAUMgeBILDe" planned by the organizers WESTERMANN and SCHNEIDER violates the principles of the state cultural policy of the GDR, both in the way it came about and in its content and form, which can be assumed from the materials available, and could therefore not be tolerated. 1.
1. a conception of content in the sense of socialist cultural policy is neither formulated nor recognizable.
2. the majority of the submissions by authors from the GDR do not meet the requirements of socialist culture, either in terms of form, aesthetics or content. For the most part, they articulate absolute criticism of phenomena of social reality in the GDR, spread skepticism and pessimism about the future, and tend toward dissolution in form, insofar as they are not banal or dilletant. These works convey a false image of the art of the GDR, especially graphic art, and serve the expectations of a certain "scene". The great problems of humanity and of the socialist society of the GDR on the way to the turn of the millennium do not appear, apart from general pacifist "admonitions.
3. the unmistakable second largest group of submissions (presumably due to similarly strong "invitations") comes from "Mail-Art" authors from the FRG and Berlin-West. Thus, already purely statistically, the FRG thesis of the "unified German nation" and the "unified German culture" is objectively supported. At the same time, the cultural agreement in preparation between the GDR and the FRG is undermined by "proving" here that an interstate agreement is not necessary at all, since with corresponding "initiatives" the contact between cultural workers, institutions, etc. of both states "works so well". Further, a "precedent" would be created for the time after the entry into force of the cultural agreement, to interpret the agreements "extensively" and to proceed like WESTERMANN and SCHNEIDER.
4. The similarity of the "socially critical" themes and statements of the "Mail Art" works from the GDR and the capitalist industrialized countries leads to the assumption of the facts that the senders from the NSW are indeed a representative cross-section, but the GDR participants are the exact opposite, namely a concentration of non-typical, The impression is that there is a "cross-system" convergence of negative phenomena in social life between socialist and capitalist industrialized countries (contradiction between "mind and power", oppression, manipulation, threat to peace through armament, egoism, fear of the future, isolation, alienation, inevitable environmental catastrophe, etc.). ).
5. the superficial and frivolous (?) or deliberately obfuscating way of processing the submissions by the two organizers with the help of their signatures would finally lead to the effect that statements of western submitters would have to be related by the exhibition visitors to their own, socialist reality. The legal assessment of the activities of WESTERMANN and SCHNEIDER is difficult. As people working in the cultural state sphere, they were certainly aware that professional contact with persons and institutions in the NSW could only take place with an explicit order, and as a rule only from the state organs responsible for this. The fact that they had the mail sent to their private addresses proves conclusively that they were aware of this situation and committed the violation intentionally.
The extent to which the necessary permits were available for the mechanically reproduced materials produced or commissioned by WESTERMANN and SCHNEIDER, or to which they acted without permits, is not known to the undersigned. In the case of illegal production, the relevant administrative penal procedures shall be carried out in any case and the highest possible penalties shall be imposed due to the significance. When reviewing the messages on the submissions, the impression arose that some of the senders from the NSW, especially from Berlin-West, are personally acquainted with WESTERMANN and/or SCHNEIDER, possibly former citizens of the GDR. The extent to which these could be criminally relevant contacts, message transmission or the like must be examined. Objectively, the "Mail-Art-Project" No. 1 presents itself as an attack on the cultural and art policy of the GDR. It is highly probable that this goal was consciously pursued by WESTERMANN or SCHNEIDER or by both. In the opinion of the undersigned, this subjective aspect in the legal sense is not provable according to the available material.
1. Lange, Bernd 2. Sonntag, Jörg 3. Rogalski, Piot 4. Hess, Hans-Jürgen 5. Hiepe, Bernd 7. Kirves, Dietmar return to top ▲
