©Kirsten Klöckner
« 14 Tage Sonne in Südfrankreich – ab heute »
(14 days of sun in the south of France – from today)
Kirsten Klöckner
2014
40 cm x 30 cm
Watercolour on paper
G. Pf. wished this painting in the context of Kirsten Klöckners series Wunschprogramm (desired programme), part three of her project BeuteKunst (looted art).
To satisfy the desire for fourteen days of sun in south of France shouldn’t generally be a big problem in the chosen area. So this wish is, on the first view, an easy one. But how should an artist manage it in this proposed special time schedule? And after all, how can an artist express fourteen days of sun? Knowing some of Kirsten’s artworks one may imagine that the result might be somehow with floral ornaments taking for example from lavender which is typical for the area or more or less abstracted beach- and seaside-impressions. Even something colourful, bathed in sunlight is conceivable.
However Kirsten surprised with fourteen squares on soft yellow ground. The colour in these squares is light blue with approximate round white sectors of different diameters in the middle of each. They are looking a bit like picture-frames or windows, opening the view to a blue sky with bright sunshine. Yellow and orange stripes, looking like coloured adhesive tapes are lying irregular over the frames, giving the impression of sunrays.
This is Kirsten’s interpretation of fourteen days of sun in the south of France. For each day there is a square with a glistering bright sky. The intensive sunrays are breaking out of these frames, to underline their force. Finally the fourteen days of sun are starting with the completion of the painting, but they will last forever.
Kirsten Klöckner – BeuteKunst – looted art
The presented painting is one of several artworks from Kirsten Klöckners series BeuteKunst III (Looted Art III). The term “looted art” has in our time rather a negative connotation. Nevertheless Kirsten uses it in a positive sense: to point out the origin of her inspiration. To underline the development from the source to the final artwork, she documented the working process of the two former series of this project: BeuteKunst I and II, during the exhibitions, on her blog and in two books.
For the project BeuteKunst I (Looted Art I) she focused for one year on the collection of the Kunstarchiv Beeskow / Art Archive Beeskow, Germany. The here preserved art works were originally commissioned by, bought by or donated to the former state German Democratic Republic (GDR). The artistic outcome from Kirsten’s forays in this collection gives a new view on the works: in her paintings she pilfers elements of the existing pictures, for example a helmet, a cup, a drinking bag and puts it in a new context.
(Exhibition 2012: Galerie des Städtischen Museums Eisenhüttenstadt, Germany / Gallery of the municipal museum of Eisenhüttenstadt)
The source of inspiration of the series BeuteKunst II has a total different nature. Kirsten selected living persons, who attracts her interest somehow, to be her muses and portrayed them. They are fellow artists, a singer and writer, a little boy, a famous gastronome, a poet … However, the results are not portraits in the conventional sense, but she captured their activities, preferences and/or characteristics. So the pictures of her muses have nothing to do with their physical appearance. Instead the paintings are showing floral and zoomorphic Ornaments, red and pink rings or perhaps isolated elements like in BeuteKunst I such as a Panda or a curtain. (Exhibition 2013: Akademie der Künste / Academy of Arts, Berlin)
Since 2014 Kirsten is once again on hunting. She is chasing wishes. In December 2013 she started her Wunschprogramm (desired programme). Friends, chance acquaintances and contacts on social networks can express their wishes. These dreams, ideas and longings find a visual expression in Kirsten’s paper works. The yearning for the end of madness got translated into a town-exit-sign, the vision of new politics for refugees became a house with a big heart in it and the wish of an image of a female worker is the picture of a woman with huge hands.
The Wunschprogramm isn’t finished jet, so you may express your wishes to leave it to Kirsten Klöckner’s interpretation and imagination to make them come true.
Kirsten Klöckner
Born 1962 in Braunschweig, Germany, Kirsten lives and works in Berlin since 2002. From 1983 to 1986 she studied sculpture at the academy of arts (Kunstakademie), Münster. 1990 she opened the edition-gallery “Edition Klöckner” in Düsseldorf, where she published graphics and multiples from A.R. Penck, Sigmar Polke, Klaus Staeck and many others. Her own works had been shown in many personal and group exhibitions and her works are in several major art collections. Two publications about the first two parts of BeuteKunst are published by the Luftschiff Verlag, Bruchweiler-Bärenbach (Germany): BeuteKunst I and Musenbesuch – BeuteKunst II. A third book about Wunschprogramm – BeuteKunst III is in preparation.
http://www.kirsten-kloeckner.de