[-empyre-] Harald Szeemann is dead on Friday ( February 18th )

["Aliette Guibert" <guibertc@criticalsecret.com>]

Source Tribune de Genève

In February 18th, 2005 20:52

Death of the art critic Harald Szeemann
BERNE ( ATS ).

The art critic Harald Szeemann, 71-year-old, died in his place of residence,
in Tessin, further to complications arisen after lung problems.  The Bernese
was internationally known for his organizer's activities of exhibitions.
The announcement of the death was made on Friday by the President of
Biennial of Venice, which Harald Szeemann steered in 1999 and 2001. " It is
a very grave loss for the world of the art, that will miss the critical
talent and the organization always in Harald Szeemann's avant-garde ",
President Davide Croff declared.

© SDA-ATS News Service

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18 février 2005 20:52

Décès du critique d'art Harald Szeemann
BERNE (ATS)

Le critique d'art Harald Szeemann, âgé de 71 ans, est mort à son domicile
tessinois suite à des complications survenues après des problèmes
pulmonaires. Le Bernois était internationalement connu pour ses activités
d'organisateur d'expositions.
L'annonce du décès a été faite vendredi par la Biennale de Venise, qu'Harald
Szeemann a dirigée en 1999 et 2001. "C'est une perte très grave pour le
monde de l'art, qui manquera du talent critique et d'organisation toujours à
l'avant-garde de Harald Szeemann", a déclaré son président Davide Croff.

© SDA-ATS News Service
---------------------------------------

Source

harald szeemann: biographical sketch
http://www.biennale-de-lyon.org/biac97/eng/szeembio.htm


Lived in Ticino, Switzerland

1933
Harald Szeemann was born on 11 June in Bern (Switzerland).
He studied Art history, archaeology and journalism.

1957
First exhibition as a curator, at St Gallen (Switzerland): "Painters Poets /
Poets Painters"

1961
Becomes the director of the Kunsthalle in Bern. It is here that he makes his
name, organising almost a dozen exhibitions per year and turning this
venerable institution into an obligatory stopping-off place for the new
generation of European and American artists.

1969
"When Attitudes Become Form: Live In Your Head" has become a historical
reference, presenting for the first time, in Europe, artists such as Joseph
Beuys, Richard Serra and Lawrence Weiner.
With this exhibition, the process of creation is now recognised as a work of
art.
Harald Szeemann becomes an independent curator.

1970
Organises "Happening and Fluxus" in Cologne. A large inventory of actions,
environments and concerts, featuring Wolf Vostell, Allan Kaprow and George
Maciunas, as well as the Viennese "Actionists", Robert Filliou and George
Brecht.

1972
Appointed curator of Documenta 5 in Kassel, he revolutionises the concept.
Conceived as a hundred-day event, he invites the artists (Joseph Beuys, Paul
Thek, Bruce Nauman, Vito Acconci, Joan Jonas, Rebecca Horn...) to present
not only paintings and sculptures, but also performances and "happenings".

1973
After the Documenta, it is the beginning of a somewhat difficult period;
firstly for financial reasons, then because of legal wrangles with the local
authorities in Kassel. Deprived of premises and credits, he decides to set
up an imaginary museum: the "Museum of Obsessions". This is the fruit of a
conceptual research effort, which, playing on transversal connections,
circumvents the over-complacent approach to the great universal themes. In
order to implement the concepts of the exhibitions of this imaginary museum,
he creates the Agency of Spiritual Guestworks, which has an international
dimension: "for spiritual work abroad".
Henceforth, his exhibitions are linked to one another, always taking up
singular or universal themes in original ways.

1974
Experiments with his exhibition concepts, such as "Grand Father" (Bern),
where, in his apartment, he presents hairdressing equipment that belonged to
his grandfather, thus re-creating a "torture chamber in the service of
beauty".

1975
Temporary show in the Museum of Obsessions: "Bachelor Machines" was mounted
in a number of European capitals. It took on the appearance of an obsession
peculiar to the single mind (Marcel Duchamp, postman Cheval), presupposing
an interior world functioning in a closed-circuit mode.

1978
Organises a series of exhibitions, then successively creates a series of
three museums (1978, 1983, 1987) on Monte Verità, a hill in the canton of
Ticino.
This is a home for utopians, anarchists and eccentrics.
The "Monte Verità-Mountain of Truth" exhibition (Ascona) uses individual
projects to present utopias of this ideal society.

1980
Creation of "Aperto", a section that presents the work of young artists in
the framework of the Venice Biennial.

1981
Appointed independent curator at the Kunsthaus in Zürich, a position that he
continues to occupy.

1983
"In Search Of Total Art Work" is an exhibition in which Harald Szeemann puts
forward a vision of the history of art based on "intense intentions" rather
than a history of masterpieces.

1986
As exhibition follows exhibition, he takes over unconventional premises,
most frequently gigantic: former stables in Vienna, the Salpêtrière hospital
in Paris, the palace in the Retiro park in Madrid. The artists he invites
set up dialogues between their works and the chosen exhibition spaces.

1988
"Zeitlos" (outside time) in Berlin.

1991
"Visionary Switzerland" is a thematic exhibition that shows, once again,
Harald Szeemann's eclecticism: his research and encyclopaedic knowledge,
which go beyond the strict field of contemporary art, his interest in the
social and historical events that have fashioned our century. He has a
marked taste for the mixing of genres, combining inventions, historical
documents and art objects.

1992
Harald Szeemann is given the responsibility for the Swiss pavilion in the
Universal Exposition in Seville. Ben exhibits his paintings: "Switzerland
does not exist", and "I think therefore I Swiss".

1993
A "Joseph Beuys" retrospective is presented at the Centre Georges Pompidou
in Paris.

1996
"Austria in a lacework of roses" is the occasion for Harald Szeemann to give
prominence to his reflections on Austrian spirituality.

( more info from our part )
1999 then 2001
Director of the Biennial of Venice.


Recently Harald Szeemann divided his time between the Kunsthaus in Zürich,
where he still holds the position of "independent curator", and his agency,
which he calls "The Factory", in Ticino, the small Alpine village where he
lived.


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