This volume commemorates AICA’s award to Walter Grasskamp of its Prize for a Distinguished Contribution to Art Criticism.
Fascinated by how artists must build up, develop, and defend their work, Walter Grasskamp wrote numerous portraits of artists between 1979 and 2019. They span four decades of writing about contemporary art, driven by enthusiasm and scepticism, in equal measure.
Under the poetic title An Angel Vanishes, he has collected nineteen monographic portraits of artists, which appear here in chronological order. The anthology focuses on the work of artists with whom he has been associated over a number of years longer period of time and has written about on several occasions, which is why there are two essays each on Hans Haacke, Sigmar Polke, and Gerhard Richter. In addition to these and other artist personalities such as Joseph Beuys and Anselm Kiefer, who achieved an early international breakthrough, lesser-known artists with their idiosyncratic works, including Markus Raetz, Aldo Walker, Axel Kasseböhmer, and Ben Willikens, also receive attention.
The main body of texts is followed by Grasskamp’s detailed reflections on the Art Market Hangover, in which he discusses the changing role of art criticism. This public sphere is critically questioned by him time and again with the same wry humour that is exemplified in the title of his recent book, Das Kunstmuseum, eine erfolgreiche Fehlkonstruktion (The Art Museum, a Successful Folly).
Nevertheless, Grasskamp never gave up art criticism. Even when he began teaching at universities and art academies, he continued to write for newspapers, magazines, and catalogues. He became known for his expertise in the fields of political theory and the social history of the museum, the exhibition business, and art in public spaces. His conversations with painters, curators and gallerists have made a significant contribution to the oral history of post-war German art.
The book concludes with an encomium by the author and art historian Julia Voss and Walter Grasskamp’s acceptance speech on the occasion of the award ceremony, which he delivered to the participants in the 52nd International AICA Congress (Cologne/Berlin) on 1 October 2019.
The English version is published by AICA Press/les presses du réel. ISBN 978-2-37896-221-0. Price: 22 euro.
Previous publications in this series:
Ticio Escobar, La invención de la distancia/The Invention of Distance (bilingual edition), n.d. AICA Press/ Ridinghouse, London, 5 x 9.13 in, publ. 8 Jan. 2014. Price $25.00. ISBN 9781905464495164. Obtainable from: info@ridinghouse.co.uk
Lee Yil, Dynamics of Expansion and Reducttion – Selected Writings on Korean Contemporary Art, 2018. Engl. ed. 17 x 23 cm. (softcover), 216 pp. (b.& w. ill.), publ .Feb. 2018. Price 18.00 €ISBN9782840669722. AICA Press/Les presses du réel, Dijon.