Exhibition programme 2013
Ludwig Forum Aachen
Jülicher Straße 97-109
52070 Aachen, Germany
Until February 17: Videozone: Artur Żmijewski: Blindly
Until February 17: The City That Doesn’t Exist. Images of Global Spaces
From March 17
The Other Americans. Discoveries of the 1970s and 1980s
Opening: Sunday, March 17, noon. Press: Thursday, March 14, 11am
Peter and Irene Ludwig started collecting American art during the 1960s in New York. In 1968 the works were shown in Aachen for the very first time worldwide. Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, Chuck Close and Duane Hanson are names that have immensely contributed to the popularity of the Ludwig collection. In their visionary ambition to establish an art collection that maps the global landscape of art, there has always been space for positions beyond big names that defy the usual classifications. The exhibition shows rarely exhibited pieces and unusual works by famous artists of the collection. Simultaneously, as part of the research project “Videoarchiv,” important positions of American video art from our collection will be shown again after a long time.
April 21–June 23
Michael E. Smith
Opening: Sunday, April 21, noon. Press: Thursday, April 18, 11am
Michael Edward Smith (b. 1977; Detroit) creates objects, images and videos that condense materials and references into an often uncanny physicality that is loaded with associations. Very different objects—sometimes with obvious references to sport and music idols of the Afro-American youth culture—are processed and “abandoned” in the exhibition room. Actually, they rather seem to haunt the room than passively occupy it. From 2004 to 2006, Smith studied in Detroit at the College for Creative Studies (CCS). In 2008 he finished his art studies as a student of Jessica Stockholder at the Department for Sculpture at Yale University. Since 2008 he has taught at the CCS. Recent exhibitions: 2011 Mönchehaus Museum, Goslar; 2012 Culturgest Lisbon; 2012 Whitney Biennial New York.
June 30–September 1
Ilka Helmig: Phénotype
Opening: Sunday, June 30, noon. Press: Thursday, June 27, 11am
Ilka Helmig (b. 1971) works on the border between art and design. After her studies of communication design in Nurnberg, she studied visual arts and founded the design bureau “Leitwerk” in Cologne. Her artistic work is shown in international exhibition projects and has received multiple awards. Since 2007 she has taught visual conception and drawing at the polytechnic in Aachen. For the Ludwig Forum, she develops a site-specific project that occupies the space and explores shapes and structures of the museum and the surroundings by means of drawing and sculpture.
July 14–September 29
Bea Otto
Opening: Sunday, July 14, noon. Press: Thursday, July 11, 11am
Bea Otto (b. 1964) studied at the art academy in Düsseldorf as a master student of David Rabinowitch as well as at the Gerrit Rietveld Academy in Amsterdam and the Art Students League, New York. Her art is directly connected to the location. Using a minimalist artistic vocabulary, she makes subtle interventions in the space thereby questioning its coordinates. The relationship between inner and outer space is transformed; levels expand, ruptures emerge, passages are barricaded and new views open up.
October 13, 2013–February 16, 2014
Nancy Graves – Retrospective
Opening: Sunday, October 13, noon. Press: Thursday, October 10, 11am
Nancy Graves (1940–1995) was the first contemporary artist to be given a solo exhibition in the Whitney Museum in New York in 1969. Since the 1970s she has been playing a special role in the art scene, her works oscillating between animals, animism and anthropology. Her camel sculptures are world-famous and as a participant of both Documenta 5 and 6 she has firmly established herself in art history. Research art, painting, dance, sculpture and documentary film are part of her artistic resources and methods. Nancy Graves has thus defined an approach to artistic work that has been a major inspiration to the following generations of artists. As a close friend of artists such as Chuck Close and Yvonne Rainer, Graves has been in the centre of the North American art scene. In Europe, however, her work has yet to be discovered. The exhibition is a cooperation with the Nancy Graves Foundation in New York and is generously supported by Kulturstiftung des Bundes, Kunststiftung NRW and Peter and Irene Ludwig Stiftung. Important loans are contributed from Vienna, London, New York and Cologne.
November 23, 2013–January 26, 2014
Videozone: Wael Shawky: Cabaret Crusades
Opening: Friday, November 22, 8pm. Press: Thursday, November 21, 11am
In his videos, the Egyptian artist Wael Shawky stages historical and political incidents and thus explores the interpretational space of history. The work Cabaret Crusades: The Horror Show Files (2010) is the first part of a trilogy. On the basis of Amin Maalouf’s book The Crusades through Arab Eyes he examines the Arab perspective of the Crusades. Using 200-year-old marionettes, he re-enacts the events that have played a key role for the developments to follow up until the political situation today. Wael Shawky (b. 1971, Alexandria) studied Visual Arts at Alexandria University and attended the Graduate School of Fine Arts of the University of Pennsylvania. He has had solo exhibitions at Nottingham Contemporary (2011) and Cittadellarte – Fondazione Pistoletto, Biella (2010). Moreover, he participated in the Istanbul Biennial (2011), the Biennale di Venezia (2003) and dOCUMENTA 13 (2012). In 2010, Shawky founded the education centre MASS Alexandria.
Ongoing presentations of our collections:
Terrains d’une Collection – From New York to Beijing
It’s your Choice – Highlights of the LUFO Collection
LUFONAUTEN – An Exhibition for Children
