Exhibition Guide
Director’s Welcome Some people say not to dwell on the past, or dream of the future, but concentrate on the moment, on the here and now. None of us are quite prepared to look back at the 2000s, yet, when one attempts, one finds that our memories of the first decade of the twenty-first century are inextricably tied up with a bombardment of information and an urge to make sense of the very times we lived in. After all, the beginning of the twenty-first century was very much like moving, with a clean slate, into a new house only to be immediately confronted with a terrible smell, forcing us to embark on house cleaning immediately. We entered this century afraid that a computer glitch – the millennial bug – would ruin our economy and our defense systems and, ever since, we have been on edge as to whether we would plunge into chaos. Little did we know that it was the various immoral schemes, frauds and bloodless treacheries committed that would lead to the global economy nose-dive and confirm our insecurities and spiritual confinement. As with our last two years at Witte de With Center for Contemporary Art, the guiding light for our 2014 artistic program continues in part to be the investigation of forms of transgression. Here we thrive on embarking on uncharted journeys that enable some degree of blood-letting, whose cleansing effect is yet to come. Our first group exhibition of the year is The Crime Was Almost Perfect, for which we have invited curator Cristina Ricupero, known for adventurous curatorial work unafraid of addressing the darker side of human nature, to work with us. Her ambitious exhibition brings together over forty artists whose obsessive curiosity and fascination with the aesthetics of crime, as it transcends
into our every day contemporary lived experience – be it via crime stories, detective novels or forensics, are to be experienced through our exhibition. Offering neither an encryption nor a pedagogical take on crime, the curatorial intention is to let the works speak for themselves, with full faith in the spectator’s capacity to relate to these multi-layered works and make their own connections. We are grateful to Cristina Ricupero for creating a space for experimentation where the divisions between the artist, the criminal, the victim, and the audience are blurred, and all the artists participating in the show for their contributions. We especially would like to thank artists Fabian Marti and Gabriel Lester here. Marti collaborated with Ricupero to set up the architecture of the show, and Lester has been with us throughout the making of this exhibition, contributing to the show with a number of anxiety-inducing interventions, including those on our institutional website leading up to the opening of the show. Special mention is also reserved here for our Deputy Director Paul van Gennip and his installation team and our Assistant Curator Virginie Bobin for her extensive work toward making this exhibition a reality. (For a full list of credits and colophon on artists, lenders, funders as well as our team, please refer to the final page of this guide.) Please mark 29 March in your calendars. As with all of our public programs, we are once again approaching this exhibition through a prismatic lens by organizing a symposium titled Cui Bono? (To Whose Benefit?) in order to look at the historical development and the basic principles of the legal system and its machinery, and analyze normative notions
of public perception. Expect a day of interpretive case studies that explore procedure versus substance. And, last but not least, a major leap forward for us: As of 24 January 2014, our building at Witte de Withstraat 50 has a new faรงade, a completely renovated entrance and reception area (which we share with our tenant; TENT), and, most significantly,
an expanded ground floor exhibition space for Witte de With Center for Contemporary Art to profile its programs more prominently at street level. To a productive and joyous season, and we hope to see more of you in 2014! Defne Ayas Rotterdam, January 2014
Curator’s Introduction Like any good detective story, art history is filled with enigmas, myths, and riddles waiting to be unraveled. Solving these intellectual puzzles is a common pleasure and few are immune to such a cultural temptation. Although the link between art and crime can be traced back to ancient times, Thomas De Quincey explicitly theorized this connection in his notorious essay “On Murder Considered As One Of The Fine Arts” (1827). The nineteenth century also saw the growing importance of photography both in the development of criminology and in the new sensationalism of the tabloid press – two phenomena that popularized the genre of the detective story. Cinema soon became the perfect medium for capturing the dubious charm of violence and transforming it into pleasurable images. Following De Quincey’s ironic proposal to analyze murder from an aesthetic point of view, The Crime Was Almost Perfect is an exhibition that invokes the spirits of visual art, architecture, cinema, criminology, and the modern crime genre, transforming the rooms of Witte de With and the streets of Rotterdam into multiple ‘crime scenes’. Beyond crime, there is Evil. Thus The Crime Was Almost Perfect necessarily examines the relationship between ethics and aesthetics. Questioning the role of authorship, authenticity, trickery, and fraud, the exhibition blurs the dichotomy between ‘good’ and ‘bad’ taste, while also highlighting the double bind of ‘crime as art’ and ‘art as crime’.
The exhibition brings together over forty local and international artists who cross the bridges linking art and the aesthetics of crime, including challenging works encompassing a multitude of artistic strategies. New and already existing projects as well as a collection of unexpected objects are immersed in unorthodox ways within an environment specially designed by Fabian Marti together with architects Charlotte Truwant and Dries Rodet, which guides the viewer through routes containing different chapters. Some of the works in the exhibition reflect the detective’s obsessive curiosity and interpretation, the narcissistic identification with the criminal, as well as the spectator’s fetishistic pleasure. A few projects deal with authenticity and frauds that could be considered as ‘art crimes’; some play with the artist’s role as subversive and marginal; others with law, order, and transgression; certain projects tend to represent crime as macabre and sublime as in the cinematic; while a few proposals provide evidence of public historical events – social, political crimes. A few projects could be said to combine selections of these main tendencies. Finally, all of these main tendencies are brought together in different degrees in several propositions. Cristina Ricupero
Works in the Exhibition Eva Grubinger puts up a flag and a brass plaque on Witte de With’s building facade, turning it into the Embassy of Eitopomar, a utopian kingdom ruled by the evil master villain Dr. Mabuse (1. Eva Grubinger, The Embassy of Eitopomar, 2013). Climbing up the stairs, the viewer will be captured by Gabriel Lester’s soundtrack from Francis Ford Coppola’s cult film The Conversation, a narrative that revolves around surveillance and paranoia – timely topics that resonate with recent international debates (2. Gabriel Lester, The Conversation Escalation, 2013). Dirk Bell proposes the anagram “terrorgasm” and immediately sets the tone (3. Dirk Bell, Terrorgasm, 2014). Close to the entrance desk, a wall painted by Jean-Luc Blanc resembles the cover of a pulp magazine signed with the show’s title (4. Jean-Luc Blanc, The Crime Was Almost Perfect, 2014).
inspired by film noir, B-movies, and pulp magazines (10. Jean-Luc Blanc, After 70 days in Yellow Hell, 2013; Long time ago while I was waiting Mum, 2013; Second Union of Parallel-ism Brothers, 2013; Never more all the Truth, 2013; Tell me more, 2013; Butcher Karma or Tudo Bom, 2013; Untitled, 1998; Untitled, 2000). Other sculptures by Monica Bonvicini further expose the artist’s interest in manifestations of power and domination through architecture and design: her hanging cord (11. Monica Bonvicini, That Hangs, 2005) or her silver chainsaw (12. Chainsaw 2, 2011), as well as her text pieces (13. Bet your sweet life, 2010; 14. Untitled, 1997) hover over the exhibition. François Curlet turns daily objects such as a moon boot or a TV screen into macabre yet humorous sculptures (15. François Curlet, #-T.V SET, 2010; 16. #-MOONBOOT, 2008).
Monica Bonvicini presents a machine of torture and desire consisting of six climbing belts in black latex suspended by chains on a slowly turning steel ring (5. Monica Bonvicini, Identify Protection, 2009). “Why is desire always linked to crime?”, a quote from Karl Holmqvist’s film, will be constantly on the spectators’ mind (6. Karl Holmqvist, I Will Make The World Explode, 2006), whereas Rupert Norfolk’s Guillotine represents the ultimate symbol of capital punishment, a disquieting presence that remains emblematic (7. Rupert Norfolk, Guillotine, 2007).
Matias Faldbakken’s on-site interventions alter the brand new building of Witte de With (17. Matias Faldbakken, various installations). The artist often appropriates punk aesthetics to reveal the absurdity of power relations, as with his black flag made of a plastic bag and a road sign (18. Matias Faldbakken, Exception of State, 2005–13). His photograph of a clown is titled after Lindbergh, the famous American aviator whose young daughter was kidnapped and killed, and John Wayne Gacy, an American serial killer from the 1970s who worked as a clown (19. Matias Faldbakken, Lindbergh and Gacy, 2005).
Markus Schinwald’s paintings seem to be the perfect hideout for secrets: The artist adds elements to second-hand bourgeois portraits through computer manipulation or restoration, thus rendering their faces unrecognizable, even inhuman (8. Markus Schinwald, Cindy; 9. Lilly, 2011). Paintings and drawings by Jean-Luc Blanc present a series of dubious characters
A circle of empty hoodies, clothing often associated with street youth but that could also evoke the Ku Klux Klan, guards the corner of a room (20. Keith Farquhar, Untitled, 2005). Their silhouettes echo Ulla von Brandenburg’s circle of clothes, alluding to departed bodies and unknown rituals
(21. Ulla von Brandenburg, Quilt I, 2008). Emilie Pitoiset highlights choreographic dynamics in a photograph depicting three bodies murdered by the mafia (22. Emilie Pitoiset, Untitled, 2009). Erik van Lieshout presents both existing and new drawings inspired by notions of accusation, guilt, and egoism (23. Erik van Lieshout, Vote for Theo, 2004; Untitled, 2013). In the film Murder in Three Acts, Aslı Çavuşoğlu mimics the television crime genre (exemplified by the series Crime Scene Investigation) showcasing exhibitions as crime scenes and art works as weapons (24. Aslı Çavuşoğlu, Murder in Three Acts, 2012–13). Fabian Marti leaves imprints of his hands throughout the gallery spaces (25. Fabian Marti, End Egoic Mind, 2010), later turning the artist’s fingerprint into gold (26. Fabian Marti, The Rise, 2008). His dream machine evokes the stroboscopic device imagined by beat poet Brion Gysin and writer William S. Burroughs to stimulate perception. Pierced with bullet holes, this metallic lamp also pays tribute to Joan Vollmer, Burroughs’ wife, killed by the writer in a game of William Tell (27. Fabian Marti, The Death of Joan Vollmer B., 2007). Marti together with architects Charlotte Truwant and Dries Rodet disrupt the exhibition space of Witte de With by displacing walls, thus catching the spectator off guard. Meanwhile Matias Faldbakken vandalizes the space by spraying a silver line across walls (28. Matias Faldbakken, Spray Measurement, 2013). Guillaume Bijl plays with the common association of the artist with the outcast, humorously emphasizing the suspicious aspect of artistic practices in the eyes of society (29. Guillaume Bijl, Suspect Objects, 1981–2006). Gabriel Lester creates a cinematographic loop of crime scenes in a park projected onto the surrounding walls and on the visitor, fetishizing violent images (30. Gabriel Lester, “The Physical Expression of Potential” (aka Neck of the Woods), 2014).
Lester also collaborates with Jonas Lund to devise viral interventions affecting the communication channels of Witte de With (Gabriel Lester & Jonas Lund, Paranoia, 2013). The cinematic is also present through the uncanny paintings, drawings, and collages of Dan Attoe (31. Dan Attoe, Cedars on the Back Road, 2013; 32. Murder Scene, 2007; 33. Biker Gang with Bonfire, 2008); Richard Hawkins, who portrays young handsome beheaded men in gothic settings (34. Richard Hawkins, Disembodied Zombie George White, 1997 (2/3); 35. Edogawa Rampo #7, #11, #12, 2010); and Dawn Mellor, who assigns impulses to murder curators and critics from a defunct group of art industry professionals: The Austerians (36. Dawn Mellor, Independent Curator (Mia Farrow), 2013; Museum Director (Judith Anderson), 2013; Art Critic (Glenn Close), 2013). Brice Dellsperger remakes scenes from his favorite films such as Brian De Palma’s Dressed to Kill or The Black Dahlia, where he or others play all roles (37. Brice Dellsperger, Body Double 1, 1995; 38. Body Double 23, 2010), and also pays tribute to underground filmmaker Kenneth Anger (39. Body Double 26, 2011). Mike Cooter’s neon and sculpture makes a direct reference to Alfred Hitchcock’s masterpiece The Rope (40. Mike Cooter, Technicolor Proof (R_O_P_E), 2013). In her gothic B-movie-style film, Aïda Ruilova features a young woman being recurrently attacked by invisible, obscure forces (41. Aïda Ruilova, Goner, 2010). A series of photographs by Joachim Koester shows the desolate setting that served as a home to Charles Manson’s ‘Family’ of murderers, whose most famous victim was Sharon Tate, Roman Polanski’s wife (42. Joachim Koester, The Barker Ranch, 2008). Words play a central role in crime stories. Douglas Gordon extracts sentences from major texts such as the Bible to reveal language’s potential for ambiguity, obscurity, and multiple meanings (43. Douglas Gordon, Pretty much
every word written, spoken, heard, overheard from 1989…, 2006). The notes that cover Raymond Pettibon’s drawings convey a dry, black sense of humor (44. Raymond Pettibon, No Title (As he hung), 2009; No Title (And what moved), 2012; No Title (Again! there is), 2012; No Title (It started in), 2009; No Title (It was with), 2009). Olivia Plender brings together comic strips and roman noir to explore the figure of the artist as genius (45. Olivia Plender, The Masterpiece, Part IV — A Weekend in the Country, 2005), while Allen Ruppersberg turns necrologies into artworks (46. Allen Ruppersberg, Study for Bookmark (Gregory Broyles); (David Powers); (Peter Alan Gloo); (Paul Barrit Humes), 1994). Bik Van der Pol’s neon sign alludes to the fascinating and devastating effect of gold, a major motivation for many greedy crimes (47. Bik van der Pol, Untitled (Gold), 2009). A set of intriguing objects of a different nature are disseminated throughout the space: the fragment of a precious glove pierced by a silver bullet (48. Jason Dodge, A Glove Finger Burnt by Silver, 2007), abandoned suitcases, a basket filled with chains and handcuffs (49. Karl Holmqvist, Untitled, 2006; 50. Untitled (Nest), 2007), or another pair of black leather gloves (51. Emilie Pitoiset, Les Indiscrets, 2013). Claire Fontaine proposes a set of cheap objects that have been manipulated to open all sorts of doors and hides a safe in a wall of the exhibition space (52. Claire Fontaine, Change, 2006; Money Trap, 2010; Untitled (Covert Table), 2011; Passe-Partout (Year of the Rabbit, 13ème), 2011; Passe-Partout (Shangai), 2012). A piece of jewelry by Teresa Margolles appears to be made of shattered windscreen glass collected from drug-related crime scenes in Mexico (53. Teresa Margolles, Joya (pulsera 2), 2007). The artists also collected weapons used by drug dealers on their victims, which she ‘transmutes’ into art objects to call attention to the daily violence on the streets of Mexico (54. Teresa Margolles, Punta (2), 2004).
Furthermore, Margolles provides the audience with distressing sounds that were recorded during an autopsy (55. Teresa Margolles, Trepanations (Sounds of the morgue), 2003). Noam Toran elevates a lie detector to the ranks of sculpture (56. Noam Toran, Polygraph, from the series Après-Coup, 2011), highlighting the role of design in both the control and facilitation of forgery and fraud. Playing with authorship and moral values, the artist, in collaboration with Onkar Kular, also proposes a mold to reproduce an iconic sculpture by Jeff Koons (57. Onkar Kular and Noam Toran, Koons Balloon Mold, from the series The MacGuffin Library, 2008). Han van Meegeren, one of the Netherlands’ most famous art forgers, who convinced many prestigious museums to buy his fake Vermeers in the 1930s, is an influential figure for the exhibition (58. Han van Meegeren, Isaac blessing Jacob, 1941). Behind the velvet curtains by Ulla von Brandenburg (59. Ulla von Brandenburg,”Vorhang, ausgeblichen I” (Rideau, décoloré I), 2013), a portrait that resembles a Modigliani and signed by another infamous forger, Elmyr de Hory, appears to be authored by Pierre Huyghe himself (60. Pierre Huyghe, De Hory Modigliani, 2007). Gardar Eide Einarsson shares with the audience a manual for hiding contraband objects in public space (61. Gardar Eide Einarsson, How To Hide Things In Public Places, 2013), while a collection of objects from the Kriminalmuseum in Graz (Austria) (62. Objects from the Hans Gross Kriminal-museum, University Museum of Karl-Franzens University Graz, Graz, Daktyloskopie – fingerprints, ca. 1920; Unresembling but identical, ca. 1920; Ear variations (“Ohrformen”), ca. 1920; Forensic photography, ca. 1890; Spurensicherungskoffer (forensics suitcase), and a series of photographs by criminologist Rodolphe Archibald Reiss show the other side of the coin: how police forces organized themselves through the elaboration of criminology and forensic sciences (63. Rodolphe Archibald Reiss, Murder of Mme Leplatenier, followed
by M. Weber’s suicide, Eclépens, 15 September 1920, 1920; Crime of Carandiru, Sao Paulo, Brazil, 1913, 1913; Handkerchief with blood stains, before cleansing, photographed with incident light, 1906, 1906; Delaporte assassination, study of hands holding the hacks by Reiss, Gimel, January 1910, 1910; Jost robbery at the Grand-Chêne, finger prints collected on a wax cloth, Lausanne, 25 November 1915, 1915; Murder of Buret by Vaskoff, footprint in Chavan’s store, 18 May 1917, 1917). A composite portrait by Einarsson, merging various facial features that physiognomy associated with criminal tendencies, recalls the prejudicial effects that such sciences produced (64. Gardar Eide Einarsson, Our Rival the Rascal, 2008–09). An installation by Jill Magid sets video recordings of a shooting on a US campus against the backdrop of Goethe’s Faust, bringing the documentary back into fiction (65. Jill Magid, Failed States, 2011). Lili ReynaudDewar stages an elaborate installation addressing Jean Genet’s life and work as a writer, an activist, and a thief (66. Lili ReynaudDewar, Some objects blackened, 2011; Ornament; Four Walls Speaking of Revolt, Media and Beauty, 2011, 2011), while Dora García invites the audience to steal a book (67. Dora García, Steal this Book, 2009). A film by Herwig Weiser and Gabriel Lester features three characters wandering in a deserted post-industrial landscape, interacting with a set of stolen artworks (68. Gabriel
Lester and Herwig Weiser, Have You Ever Stolen a Real McCarty…?, 1997). Strangely subversive, an early video by Pierre Huyghe portrays the artist returning objects to several shops, literally reversing the gesture of stealing (69. Pierre Huyghe, Dévoler (Unstealing), 1994). Julien Prévieux purchased a collection of books that belonged to Bernard Madoff, a former stockbroker and financial advisor who was convicted of fraud and whose belongings were in turn sold at auction. Together with the accompanying sound piece, the books tell stories of greed, power, and immorality (70. Julien Prévieux, Forget the Money, 2011). A monumental installation by Kader Attia evokes an oppressive labyrinth where images from his own private collection of newspapers and comic strips repeatedly depict the non-Western person as a beast or monster – like in the manipulations undertaken by colonialist propaganda (71. Kader Attia, The Construction of Evil, 2014). The artist’s series of scattered mirrors evokes in turn an impossible act of repair (72. Kader Attia, Reparatur #6, #7, #8, #9, #10, 2013). Jim Shaw ironically portrays businessmen as zombies through a set of paintings and a film (73. Jim Shaw, Zombie Painting #4; Zombie Panel #3; 72. The Hole, 2007), while Saâdane Afif, with a touch of black humor, presents the Centre Pompidou as a coffin softly killing the museum (74. Saâdane Afif, L’Humour Noir, 2010).
Public Programs More Than Meets The Eye Film Program Saturday 25 January Location: Cinérama, Rotterdam In conjunction with the exhibition The Crime Was Almost Perfect, Witte de With presents More Than Meets The Eye, a film program that continues the exploration of crime in art and cinema. Narration, suspense, voyeurism, and the relation between design and crime are played out in selected films by Lene Berg, Keren Cytter, Dias & Riedweg, Willie Doherty, Beatrice Gibson, Alexandra Midal, Michael Portnoy, Nicolas Provost, Aïda Ruilova, Hans Schabus, and Tobias Zielony. This film program is presented with the kind cooperation of the International Film Festival Rotterdam.
Cui Bono? (To Whose Benefit?) A symposium pitting truth against legal procedure Saturday 29 March, 12 — 6 pm Location: Auditorium, Witte de With What is the law, and how does it function? How are its rules written, interpreted, and implemented across different contexts? Moreover, what is really at stake when we say a case is lost or won? Beginning with a keynote lecture on the historical development of the legal system and its machinery, this day-long symposium seeks to understand how legal procedures either facilitate or complicate normative notions of what is fair through a series of interpretive case studies.
This Is What Happened 2.30 — 3.45 pm Beatrice Gibson, The Tiger’s Mind, 2012 (25 min); Michael Portnoy, Thrillochromes, 2013 (15 min); Dias & Riedweg, Crime Master, 2013 (5 min); Willie Doherty, Non Specific Threat, 2004 (8 min); Tobias Zielony, Vele di Scampia, 2009 (9 min).
Master Classes Witte de With offers a series of master classes related to the exhibition. More details on these public programs will be announced on www.wdw.nl.
Crime and Design 4 — 4.30 pm Alexandra Midal, Hocus Pocus: Twilight in my Mind, 2009 (30 min). Let’s Do It Again 4.45 — 5.45 pm Nicolas Provost, The Dark Galleries, 2013 (11 min); Lene Berg, Dirty Young Loose, 2013 (32 min); Aïda Ruilova, Goner, 2010 (15 min); Keren Cytter, Corrections, 2013 (8 min).
Crime Does Pay! The Impact of Forensics on the Production and Perception of Art Thursday 13 February, 10 am — 5 pm With Michael Zinganel (Artist and Writer, Vienna) Design for Crime Thursday 24 April, 10 am — 5 pm With Alexandra Midal (Historian of Design, Paris)
Publication Spring 2014 A reader compiling source texts, detective fiction, newly commissioned texts, and visual documentation is published in conjunction with the exhibition. Paying tribute to the format of paperback crime novels, the book provides an in-depth reflection on the double bind between ‘art as crime’ and ‘crime as art’.
Biographies Saâdane Afif’s (b. 1970, France) installations, comprising performance, objects, sculptures, text, posters, and works in neon, are partially created through collaborations with artist friends, curators, or critics, and activated in exhibitions through actual and imagined performances of people, music, and light. Kader Attia (b. 1970, France) uses his own background, defined by several cultures simultaneously, to explore the impact of Western cultural and political capitalism on the Middle East, Africa, Asia, and Latin America, in relation to histories of colonization and immigration. Dan Attoe’s (b. 1975, United States) work often revolves around the unpolished aspect of urban and rural life, with a twist of mysticism. Dirk Bell’s (b. 1969, Germany) work takes a range of seemingly contradictory visual signs and symbols – from minimalism, Jugendstil, or symbolism – and incorporates them in analytical, ambivalent, and critical paintings, drawings, and installations. Guillaume Bijl (b. 1946, Belgium) questions the necessity of art by transforming museums and art galleries into fitness centers, lighting shops, carpet stores, travel agencies, driving schools, etc., creating a perplexing interplay between fiction and reality. Bik Van der Pol (founded in 1995 by Liesbeth Bik and Jos Van der Pol) explores the potential of art to produce and transmit knowledge, through co-operation and research methodologies focused on how to activate situations so as to create a platform for various kinds of communicative activities.
Jean-Luc Blanc (b. 1965, France) borrows his imagery from cinema or magazines, and confronts the permanence and exactness of photographic reproducibility with his artistic subjectivity. Monica Bonvicini (b. 1965, Italy) confronts the viewer with drawings, sculptures, installations, videos, and photographs that investigate the relationship between space, power, and gender, with a specific focus on ‘building’, often reinforced by biting humor. Ulla von Brandenburg (b. 1974, Germany) creates multi-layered narratives that explore the gap between fiction and reality and contemporary collective experience, through recurring themes taken from expressionist theatre, literature, pre-Freudian psychoanalysis, and early cinema. Aslı Çavuşoğlu’s (b. 1982, Turkey) projects examine the way in which cultural and historical facts are transformed, represented, and interpreted by individuals, highlighting the precarious and subjective nature of our shared histories. Claire Fontaine’s (artist collective founded in 2004) work comments on global events, politics, and society through the détournement of powerful symbols and objects, and criticizes the political impotence and the crisis of singularity that seem to define contemporary life. Mike Cooter (b. 1978, United Kingdom) investigates the narrative agency and evidential potential of sculptural artifacts through interdisciplinary research and densely layered installations that incorporate correspondence, interviews, loaned and re-fabricated objects, and archival material.
François Curlet’s (b. 1967, France) work often applies a twist of poetics, humor, and absurdity to readymade objects or language, in a surprising and perplexing manner.
Douglas Gordon’s (b. 1966, Scotland) work often involves memory and the disruption of perception; by making his audience aware of their own fugitive subjectivity, he questions how we give meaning to our experience of things.
Brice Dellsperger’s (b. 1972, France) work deals with the body and sexuality, largely through the ongoing Body Double series, remakes of films where all the characters are played by transvestites.
Eva Grubinger’s (b. 1970, Austria) sculptures and installations appropriate form and place in order to modify scale and to recharge them with new meaning.
Jason Dodge (b. 1969, United States) is a sculptor who draws objects from everyday life to explore their narrative potential. His work may appear to be materially minimal, but it often belies a complex artistic process.
Richard Hawkins’ (b. 1961, United States) oeuvre, spanning over two decades, is well known for its collages, which he treats not only as technique, but also as a philosophy or methodology.
Gardar Eide Einarsson’s (b. 1976, Norway) texts, installations, and drawings appropriate and re-contextualize imagery from subcultures to critically explore various forms of social transgression and arguments for political subversion.
Karl Holmqvist (b. 1964, Sweden) works with the media of video, installation, artist’s books, and live performance, often with a view on spoken and written language and different aspects of human communication.
Matias Faldbakken (b. 1973, Denmark) often uses ‘vandal’ tools and techniques, tearing out and erasing to create aesthetic forms. He is interested in the inter-breeding between so-called progressive environments and the worlds of commerce. Keith Farquhar (b. 1969, United Kingdom) develops the proposition of the readymade and strips gesture to a state of raw economy, through the use and misuse of current technologies and the appropriation of existing artworks. Dora García (b. 1965, Spain) uses the exhibition space as a platform to investigate the relationship between the visitor, artwork, and place, through minimal changes in the space that convert the room into a sensory experience.
Elmyr de Hory (1905–76) was a Hungarianborn art forger, who during his life allegedly sold over one thousand forgeries to museums and galleries around the world, his most famous having been painted in the styles of Picasso, Matisse, and Modigliani. Pierre Huyghe’s (b. 1962, France) work frequently mixes fact with fiction in unexpected locations, such as the Wollman skating rink in Central Park, the Sydney Opera House, or even Antarctica. Joachim Koester (b. 1962, Denmark) makes use of historical documentary material to create a fictional narrative, working with the notions of the unknown, in its scientific, metaphysical, and historical variety. Onkar Kular (b. 1974, United Kingdom) uses of contemporary design practice to engage with a wide range of cultural and popular issues, from everyday rituals, like drinking tea, to concepts, like domestic perfection.
Gabriel Lester’s (b. 1972, the Netherlands) all-encompassing artistic practice, comprising films and site-specific installations, often adopts cinematographic aspects. Erik van Lieshout’s (b. 1968, The Netherlands) often provocative work deals with violence, politics, sex, and commercial culture with a humorous, candid, and scornful tone, taking a deeply personal approach. Jonas Lund’s (b. 1984, Sweden) practice explores the mechanisms that constitute our shared online experiences, by combining software-based works with media and exhibition strategies not associated with online environments. Jill Magid’s (b. 1973, United States) artistic practice involves personal engagement with impersonal bureaucratic structures of power, like the police, the secret service, and CCTV, questioning their omniscient point of view, their storage of memory, their authority, and their potential reversibility. Teresa Margolles’ (b. 1963, Mexico) work reveals deep involvement with socioeconomic inequality and exploitation, cultural attitudes to death, and the function of violence in society, through the use of media such as blood, body fat, or even water used to wash dead corpses, which confront people’s fears of contact with mortality. Fabian Marti’s (b. 1979, Switzerland) artistic research focuses on esoteric symbolism, cultural anthropology, music, and scientific debates, making use of versatile media, such as photography, film, photograms, ceramics, and installation.
Han van Meegeren (1889–1947, the Netherlands) is considered one of the most notorious and ingenious art forgers of the twentieth century, his most famous forgery being The Supper at Emmaus, painted in the style of Johannes Vermeer. Dawn Mellor (b. 1970, United Kingdom) deconstructs, by means of black humor, the interactive structure of the cult of celebrity in her images, fabricating a relationship between the star and his/her believer, the fan. Rupert Norfolk’s (b. 1974, United Kingdom) work investigates the perceptual and conceptual possibilities of both concrete things and their depiction, often subtly manipulating mundane objects to confuse the viewer’s eye. Raymond Pettibon (b. 1957, United States) is best known for acerbic drawings that pitilessly critique contemporary culture, using the comic-book format of image and text. Emilie Pitoiset’s (b. 1980, France) work plays with narrative constructions that move between documentary and pure invention, confronting the viewers with their own perceptive faculties and their necessary limitations. Michael Portnoy’s (b. 1971, United States) practice spans dance-theater, vocal powertools, Relational Stalinism, reptangles, abstract gambling, the improvement of biennials, and Icelandic cockroach porn. His art circles the rules of play and communication – language itself playing a crucial role in the works. Olivia Plender’s (b. 1977, United Kingdom) work addresses historical issues such as early twentieth-century spiritualism and social movements, as well as questions arising from contemporary knowledge economy values.
Julien Prévieux’s (b. 1974, France) artistic practice involves him infiltrating different systems of society to prove their absurd and deceptive nature, and using techniques of appropriation and parody to unveil uneasy truths.
Jim Shaw’s (b. 1952, United States) work is inspired by protest posters, thrift store paintings, comic books, rock albums, pulp novels, and advertisements, dealing with American social phenomena, as well as his own personal life and unconscious.
Rodolphe Archibald Reiss (b. 1875, Germany, d. 1929, Yugoslavia) was a publicist, a chemist, a professor of criminology at the University of Lausanne, and a famous forensic scientist.
Noam Toran’s (b. 1975, United States) artistic practice explores how fiction influences collective consciousness, through the deconstruction and reconfiguration of cinematic and literary codes, conventions, and structures.
Lili Reynaud-Dewar’s (b. 1975, France) work navigates between the autobiographical (using her own body as well as the bodies of her family and friends) and references to the legacy of twentieth-century artistic figures to question the limits and boundaries of authorship. Aïda Ruïlova’s (b. 1974, United States) precisely edited montages are partially inspired by the B-movie horror genre as well as avantgarde filmmakers. Allen Ruppersberg (b. 1944, United States), one of America’s pioneering conceptual artists, takes as source material diverse items stemming from American popular culture of the mid-twentieth century, exploring consumer society and mass media in a manner that is both playful and critical. Markus Schinwald (b. 1973, Austria) is a versatile artist, working with media from choreography to painting, who is fascinated with the body as a cultural construct, psychological connection with space and the body, dysfunctionality, and instability.
Herwig Weiser (b. 1969, Austria) uses scientific methods, from experimental programming to mechanical engineering, to create his very own aesthetic machines and explores nature, ferroconcrete buildings, and legalveorders, as if they were something similar to datastreams or algorithms. Cristina Ricupero (Italy and Brazil) is a Parisbased independent curator and art critic. She has curated exhibitions world wide, and is known for her special interest in social issues and the construction of story lines through exhibitions, in projects such as Fundamentalisms of the New Order (Kunsthal Charlottenborg, 2002), Populism (Contemporary Art Centre, Vilnius; the National Museum of Art, Architecture and Design, Oslo; the Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam, and the Frankfurter Kunstverein, 2005), and, most recently, Secret Societies (Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt and CAPC de Bordeaux, 2011–12). She was also commissioned to cover the European section of the Gwangju Biennale in South Korea (2006) and co-curated a group exhibition with artist Fabian Marti: Cosmic Laughter – timewave zero then what? at the Ursula Blickle Stiftung, Germany (2012). Some of her latest exhibitions include Suspicious Minds at Galeria Vermelho, Sao Paulo, Brazil (2013) – a prelude to The Crime Was Almost Perfect.
Credits The Crime Was Almost Perfect 24.01.14 — 27.04.14 Curated by Cristina Ricupero (Independent Curator and Art Critic) Organized with Virginie Bobin (Assistant Curator, Witte de With)
Support for participating artists in The Crime Was Almost Perfect has been provided by the following national foundations Bundesministerium für Unterricht und Kunst (Vienna), Institut Français, Pro Helvetia, Office for Contemporary Art Norway (OCA), Outset Netherlands, SAHA
Exhibition Architecture Fabian Marti in collaboration with Charlotte Truwant & Dries Rodet More Than Meets The Eye Organized by Cristina Ricupero and Samuel Saelemakers Cui Bono? (To Whose Benefit?) Organized by Defne Ayas, Virginie Bobin, Adam Kleinman Support Witte de With Center for Contemporary Art would like to thank the artists, galleries, lending institutions and collections as well as national and private foundations and organizations, without whom this exhibition could not have happened Additional support has generously been provided by Galerie Peter Kilchmann (Zürich), Galerie Krinzinger (Vienna), Yvon Lambert Gallery (Paris), Nagel-Draxler Gallery (Berlin-Köln), Galerie Georges-Philippe & Nathalie Vallois (Paris), Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Kunsthalle Wien (Vienna) Support for the public program is provided by Sjöcrona Van Stigt Advocaten (Rotterdam)
Lenders Witte de With Center for Contemporary Art is thankful to the following institutions and collections for lending us works for the exhibition: Galerie Michel Rein (Paris), Peres Projects (Berlin), Art: Concept (Paris), Galeri NON (Istanbul), Air de Paris (Paris), Standard (Oslo), Galerie Kerstin Engholm (Vienna), Galerie NEU (Berlin), Marian Goodman Gallery (New York), Jan Mot (Brussels), Saatchi Gallery (London), Gabriel Rolt Galerie (Amsterdam), Sadie Coles HQ (London), Klemm’s (Berlin), Mary Mary (Glasgow), Praz-Delavallade (Paris), Fons Welters (Amsterdam), Galerie Kathy van der Pas & Steven van de Raadt (Rotterdam), Galerie Jousse Entreprise (Paris), Collection Corvi-Mora (London), Collection FRAC ChampagneArdenne (Reims), Hans Gross Kriminalmuseum (Graz), Collection Erling Kagge, Collection Laurent Laclos (Paris), Collection Lambert en Avignon, Collection Daniel Lebard, Patricia Marshall Collection (Los Angeles), Olbricht Collection (Essen), Snare/ Christiansen Collection (Oslo), Musée de l’Elysée (Lausanne), Zabludowicz Collection (London)
Acknowledgements
Witte de With
Witte de With would like to thank Priv.-Doz. DDr. Christian Bachhiels (Hans Gross Kriminalmuseum), Sjarel Ex and Friso Lammertse (Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen), Pr. Jeanne Gaakeer (Erasmus University, Rotterdam), Anne Millet, Alexandra Midal, Thomas Olbricht, Julia Rust (Me Collector Room, Berlin), Mr. A.J.M. de Swart (Sjöcrona Van Stigt Advocaten). And, last but not least, to IFFR’s Rutger Wolfson, Edwin Carels, Mirjam Klootwijk, Frank van der Horst for the film program More Than Meets The Eye (25 January 2014), and Kristin Metho.
Director & Curator Defne Ayas Deputy Director Paul van Gennip Business Coordinator Sarah van der Tholen Managing Curator & Publications Amira Gad Curator of Education & Theory Yoeri Meessen Associate Curator Samuel Saelemakers Assistant Curator Virginie Bobin Chief Editor, WdW Review Adam Kleinman PR & Communication Josine Sibum Siderius Office Coordinator & Communication Angélique Kool Office Manager Gerda Brust Office Assistants Emmelie Mijs, Wendy Bos Reception Desk Erik Visser, Erwin Nederhoff Technician Line Kramer Curatorial Intern Iines Råmark
The curator of the exhibition would like to especially thank Defne Ayas for her great support in the realization of this project as well as Paul van Gennip and Virginie Bobin for their fantastic input and she extends her thanks to ‘Belvedere, Vienna’, Kader Attia, Ami Barak, Jean-Luc Blanc, Ina Blom, Gabriel Lester, Fabian Marti, Jonathan Martin, Jean-Charles Massera, Alexandra Midal, Rupert Norfolk, Annemarie Reichen, Caroline Schneider and Bettina Steinbrugge. Exhibition Guide Editors Cristina Ricupero, Defne Ayas, Virginie Bobin English Copy Editors Marnie Slater, Amira Gad Dutch Copy Editors Josine Sibum Siderius, Samuel Saelemakers Translation (English to Dutch) Wouter Kruithof Design A Practice for Everyday Life, London Printer Platform P, Rotterdam
External Administration Frank van Balen, Suzanne van Heck Installation Team Ties Ten Bosch, Jonathan den Breejen, Carlo van Driel, Rick Eikmans, Chris van Mulligen, Hans Tutert Reception Desk Francine van Blokland, Ella Broek, Marguerite de Geus, Rabin Huissen, Laura Lappi, Gino van Weenen, Serena Williams. Art Mediators Lisa Diederik, Fleur Flohil, Merel van der Graaf, Hannah Kalverda, Hanna van Leeuwen, Germa Roos, Gino van Weenen, Marloes van der Wiel Witte de With Board Kees Weeda (President), Patrick van Mil (Treasurer), Bart de Baere, Claire Beke, Ellen Gallagher, Nicoline van Harskamp, Jeroen Princen, Karel Schampers, Nathalie de Vries, Chris de Jong (Business Advice) Witte de With Center for Contemporary Art is supported by
The Crime Was Almost Perfect 24.01.14 — 27.04.14 Featured Artists Saâdane Afif, Kader Attia, Dan Attoe, Dirk Bell, Guillaume Bijl, Bik Van der Pol, Jean-Luc Blanc, Monica Bonvicini, Ulla von Brandenburg, Aslı Çavuşoğlu, Mike Cooter, François Curlet, Brice Dellsperger, Jason Dodge, Claire Fontaine, Gardar Eide Einarsson, Matias Faldbakken, Keith Farquhar, Dora García, Douglas Gordon, Eva Grubinger, Richard Hawkins, Karl Holmqvist, Pierre Huyghe, Joachim Koester, Onkar Kular, Gabriel Lester, Erik van Lieshout, Jonas Lund, Teresa Margolles, Jill Magid, Fabian Marti, Han van Meegeren, Dawn Mellor, Rupert Norfolk, Raymond Pettibon, Emilie Pitoiset, Olivia Plender, Michael Portnoy, Julien Prévieux, Rodolphe Archibald Reiss, Lili Reynaud-Dewar, Aïda Ruilova, Allen Ruppersberg, Markus Schinwald, Jim Shaw, Noam Toran, Herwig Weiser Curated by Cristina Ricupero Exhibition Architecture Fabian Marti in collaboration with Charlotte Truwant & Dries Rodet
Witte de With Center for Contemporary Art Witte de Withstraat 50 3012 BR Rotterdam The Netherlands
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