Martin Kippenberger at MoMA
Martin Kippenberger: The Problem Perspective recently opened at MoMA New York and is the first large scale retrospective of Kippenberger’s work in the US since his death in 1997. The exhibit was originally organized by The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (MOCA). The exhibition is curated by Ann Goldstein, MOCA Senior Curator, and organized at MoMA by Ann Temkin, The Marie-Josée and Henry Kravis Chief Curator of Painting and Sculpture.
Kippenberger is most renowned for his seminal role in contemporary “Bad Painting,” as well as for his sprawling sculptural installations, but this exhibit also places due emphasis on Kippenberger’s most mundane area of production — his poster, invitation and book designs.
Kippenberger, to me, epitomizes the role of the modern artist. You can quarrel with his methods, personality or persona, but its hard to say that his work didn’t speak to the time in which he lived. He was very aware of the conversation and history of art as is evidenced in his preoccupation with inside the art world jokes and pokes at fellow artists that require a lot of contextural knowledge to fully appreciate. He was also an artist that shed the role of ‘painter’ and was able to work across a wide spectrum of media and styles.
Here is a great review of the original show at MoCA in Los Angeles
A great Village Voice article
Martin Kippenberger: The Problem Perspective
March 1, 2009–May 11, 2009
The Joan and Preston Robert Tisch Exhibition Gallery, sixth floor
One of the most significant and influential artists of our time, Martin Kippenberger (1953–1997) produced a complex and richly varied body of work from the mid-1970s until his untimely death in 1997 at the age of forty-four. This ambitious, large-scale exhibition includes key selections and bodies of work from his entire career: paintings, sculpture, works on paper, installations, multiples, photographs, posters, announcement cards, books, and music. The exhibition will be accompanied by a fully illustrated catalogue—published by MOCA and co-published by the MIT Press—which will constitute a comprehensive and scholarly examination of the artist’s career.