Anne Imhof
Parade
July 13–September 8, 2013
July 12, 8pm
Opening and performance of Aqua Leo, 1st of at least two
July 13, 4pm
Performance of School of the Seven Bells, 4th of at least three
Ongoing performance starting from 11am
September 7, 7pm
Performance of Ähjeii, followed by a concert of Beautiful Balance
From 10pm: DJ Chloé at Robert-Johnson, Offenbach
Portikus
Alte Brücke 2 / Maininsel
60594 Frankfurt am Main
T +49 69 962 44 540
info [at] portikus.de
Portikus is pleased to present the first institutional solo exhibition of Anne Imhof. The show offers comprehensive insight into Imhof’s artistic approach and illustrates the complexity with which she endows her work. Taking up the history of performance in the domain of art as well as music and choreography, the artist examines traditional images, structures, and processes and develops new tactics that contribute to an expanded conception of performance. A crucial aspect of this endeavor is her engagement with a much-discussed genre often felt to be fraught with problems: the documentation of performance. The exhibition at Portikus shows how Imhof has found ways to straighten out the impermanence of performance in terms of time as well as space by introducing a variety of media such as film, drawing, and installation.
The films on display in the main gallery show three performances by the artist. The work School of the Seven Bells translates Robert Bresson’s film Pickpocket (1959) into a complex choreography that took months to develop and rehearse, portraying the dance of pocket-picking. Imhof’s most recent work, Aqua Leo, 1st of at least two, created for the exhibition at Portikus, is based on rituals and secret signs the doormen at the legendary music club Robert-Johnson in Offenbach exchange at night. The artist takes up insiders’ codes that hint at affiliations in particular communities and sets them in new contexts.
Anne Imhof’s works are designed from the outset to exist in multiple versions that unfold over an indeterminate period of time and in various places. The performance Ähjeii, for example, was first staged in 2010 as the artist’s contribution to the annual Städelschule Rundgang; a more elaborate implementation was presented at the same event in 2011. In 2012, she filmed another enactment and then showed the video while performing a live sound composition to go alongside. For her exhibition at Portikus, Imhof went back to Ähjeii once more, filming the choreography in a public space without spectators, effectively producing an imitation advance documentation of the piece. This turn exemplifies the artist’s strategy of disassociating the medium of performance art from the classical sequence of “audience—event—documentation.”
Imhof applies the same approach to the two other works presented at Portikus, Aqua Leo, 1st of at least two and School of the Seven Bells. Like Ähjeii, they take place in new variants over the course of the exhibition’s duration. The actors’ movements, gestures, signs, and glances prerecorded on film—and even the actors themselves—will be clearly recognizable. The use of sound adds another layer to the artist’s interest in interrogating the notion of “real experience.” Working with Billy Bultheel of the Institute of Applied Theater Studies at the University of Gießen, Imhof has developed a multipart composition that becomes part of the installation, with live presentations during the performances. A language emerges that communicates not through words but through the interplay between image, movement, and sound.
The exhibition at Portikus also features an oversized drawing attached to the ceiling of the gallery. It shows sketches for the sequences of actions during the performances, movement patterns for the actors, and lines indicating the division into groups. In order to illustrate the significance of the process—including the drafts and documents describing the development of Imhof’s pieces—for the complex construct of the work, there is a selection of Imhof’s drawings shown on the upper floor.
The exhibition closes on September 7 with a concert by Imhof’s band Beautiful Balance at Portikus and a party with DJ Chloé at Robert-Johnson.
The exhibition will be accompanied by a publication. Anne Imhof will also make an artist’s edition.
For more information and guided tours of the exhibition, please contact us at info [at] portikus.de or at T +49 69 9624454-0.
The exhibition is supported by Stiftung Polytechnische Gesellschaft, Frankfurt am Main.
Director: Nikolaus Hirsch
Curator: Sophie von Olfers
Anne Imhof’s exhibition is one in a series of exhibitions titled MainWerk – a cooperation between Stiftung Polytechnische Gesellschaft, Frankfurt am Main, the Städelschule, and Portikus. Once every year, the exhibition series seeks to show an exhibition created especially for Portikus by a former Städelschule student who has successfully pursued a career as an artist after graduation and is being exhibited on the national or international stage. By showing his or her work at the Portikus, the series seeks to present the artist in Frankfurt and give his or her work local visibility. With this exhibition series, Stiftung Polytechnische Gesellschaft, Frankfurt am Main, seeks to draw attention to Frankfurt’s contribution to contemporary art and to support young artists from Frankfurt.
Stiftung Polytechnische Gesellschaft, Frankfurt am Main, was founded in 2005. Its philanthropic work is concentrated in three main areas: education, science, and technology; arts and culture, including preservation of the city’s cultural heritage; and social, charitable, and humanitarian work. It seeks to contribute to Frankfurt’s development as a model modern and citizen-centered urban society.
