Wolfgang Becker
Video interview with Wolfgang Becker, founding director of the Neue Galerie, by Anna Sophia Schultz, September, 2017
Have a look
Video interview with Wolfgang Becker, founding director of the Neue Galerie, by Anna Sophia Schultz, September, 2017
Have a look
Could you tell me about your taking office at the ICC (now the M HKA – Museum of Contemporary Art in Antwerp) and the beginnings of video? I became the director in 1972. In 1972, Jacques Ledoux, the director of the Museum of Cinema in Brussels, organized the last experimental film festival in Knokke. He …
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You first worked at the Institute for Technical Acoustics in Jülich, at the Technical University in Aachen. What were then your first steps into experimenting with art? What did you find interesting about art as a form of expression? I learned to be a radio and television technician as well as an electronics technician. After …
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In 1969 you moved from San Francisco, where you’d studied painting at the San Francisco Art Institute, to New York. What did this move mean for your artistic work? I had been doing hard-edge geometric paintings in graduate school. When I arrived in New York, I had a kind of crisis, seeing new minimalist works …
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You completed your dissertation in art history at the University of Munich in 1972 and then worked as a journalist and proofreader. How did you get started as an artist and how did you get interested in video? Music and visual art were, and still are, pivotal interests and practices. After leaving school I didn’t …
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Could you tell me where you got the idea for the event Artists’ Proposals for Closed-Circuit Television (1971)? The Artists’ Proposals for Closed-Circuit Television originated from yet another event, which took place at Jacques-Louis Nyst’s brother’s house. One of our friends collected films from the “Wet Dreams Festival,” an Asian porn film festival in Amsterdam. …
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Jikyo Jyutu, 1975 Jikyo Jyutu is a traditional Japanese stretching exercise that releases tension from the joints, reforms the pelvis, and stimulates circulation. It was invented about 100 years ago. Despite its dynamic actions, the efficient use of rebounds and reflections of body parts prevents physical pain. This piece was created with the hope of healing the body and soul of the viewers …
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In 1978/79 you had an exhibition with Fabrizio Plessi at the Neue Galerie, where you performed Water Face. I wanted to figure out together with you how this performance came about. I was living in Italy at that time, in Milan, since 1973. I was originally educated as a musician, as a flutist. Then I …
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Lou Jonas: If I understand correctly, your piece A Landscape near Erménonville Seen by a Camera (1975) was produced in 16mm for a French television program. Michael Leisgen: Yes. At the Paris Biennale, we presented a sort of installation with two large photos. It was exhibited in a round room, and in the middle there …
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I would like to briefly introduce the context in which you started making videos. You collaborated with the Antwerp ICC’s Continental Studio to make your first works. Yes, whoever wanted to make video art went to Flor Bex. All this cost nothing. Were you free to direct your works? I’m referring in particular to the …
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When did you begin your collaborative work as Planstudio Siepmann and how did it all develop initially? What are the characteristic features of the collaboration? In the 1960s and early 1970s, our interests converged: our close affinity with nature and the multiplicity of our artistic activities. The ruthless overexploitation of resources taking place globally, the …
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If I understand correctly, the adventure of the TV program Vidéographie began in 1976 when you were director of the RTBF in Liège, and you were the one to suggest to Jean-Paul Tréfois and Paul Paquay that a magazine show on new media should be created. The story goes back even further than that. In …
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What role does video play in your artistic work? Video was like making a film except it was cheaper and faster. But the quality was limited and showing the finished piece was also limited to the size of the audience and the size of your TV set. When exactly did you become interested in video …
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