Martin Kippenberger / Martin Kippenberger, The happy end of Franz Kafka’s “Amerika”
KIPPENBERGER Martin (Dortmund 1953 - Vienna 1997), Hamurg, Deichtorhallen - Oktagon Verlag, 1999, 29,2x22,5 cm., hardcover. pp. 80, typographic cover, catalog illustrated with tens of colored images, essays in German and English by Zdenek Felix (From Kafka to Kippenberger), Rudolf Schmitz (The Unfinished Happy End), Vei Loers (Do not alight while train is in motion). With of the exhibitions by the artist. Published in conjunction of the exhibition (Hamburg, Deichtorhallen, from February 12 to April 25, 1999).
KIPPENBERGER Martin (Dortmund 1953 - Vienna 1997), Hamurg, Deichtorhallen - Oktagon Verlag, 1999, 29,2x22,5 cm., hardcover. pp. 80, typographic cover, catalog illustrated with tens of colored images, essays in German and English by Zdenek Felix (From Kafka to Kippenberger), Rudolf Schmitz (The Unfinished Happy End), Vei Loers (Do not alight while train is in motion). With of the exhibitions by the artist. Published in conjunction of the exhibition (Hamburg, Deichtorhallen, from February 12 to April 25, 1999).
KIPPENBERGER Martin (Dortmund 1953 - Vienna 1997), Hamurg, Deichtorhallen - Oktagon Verlag, 1999, 29,2x22,5 cm., hardcover. pp. 80, typographic cover, catalog illustrated with tens of colored images, essays in German and English by Zdenek Felix (From Kafka to Kippenberger), Rudolf Schmitz (The Unfinished Happy End), Vei Loers (Do not alight while train is in motion). With of the exhibitions by the artist. Published in conjunction of the exhibition (Hamburg, Deichtorhallen, from February 12 to April 25, 1999).
"Kippenberger's large installation "The Happy End of Franz Kafka's 'Amerika'" is a key work for the understanding of his artistic intentions. It is, so to speak, his "opus magnum," his central work, the completion of which occupied him for more than three years. Photographs taken in his studio in St. Georgen give evidence of the gradual creation of the different elements for the future installation. Kippenberger said: "I had a table reconstructed at which (Robert) Musil wrote his novel 'Man Without Qualities, an endless story. Just as in the cycle of paintings 'The Raft of the Medusa, 'The Happy End of Franz Kafka's "Amerika'"' is a motion, a move into something else, a transition. In 'The Happy End of Franz Kafka's "Amerika' it is the different decades; everybody certainly remembers one of the chairs, which embodies for you this or that, and you are back in that time, it's like a visual reference book. By means of the tables and the eight books which were published in Rotterdam on the occasion of the exhibition, people can make up their own conversations or interviews which cross their minds. Suddenly you have different ideas and can tell yourself a story." extract from the essay by Rudolf Schmitz
