Der Baum, die Wiedergabe

The Tree, the Reproduction

CR 22. Year 1971

Der Baum Cr 22 2 Web
Der Baum Jochen Gerz Cr 22 Web

    Jochen Gerz doesn’t work after, or in parallel with nature, nor is nature ever identified in his work with landscape or the cosmos, flora or fauna – themes to which the artist might devote himself with a critical, ecological or romantic impetus. Nature appears in Gerz’s work instead only as a fragment, an obvious illustration, an image excerpt – the unattainable goal of a never-ending attempt at describing it. It is thus never nature itself that speaks, is seen or discerned here, but rather always its counter-image, counter-text.

    Peter Friese 1991 Translated by e_CR editors

    Die Bilder am Baum ersetzen seine Blätter. Sie sind somit nicht das wofür sie stehen, bzw. hängen, sondern Surrogate, Abbilder, Kopien. Der Baum könnte auch tot sein und das, was auf ihm wächst, wäre nur mit Hilfe der Sofortbildtechnik "gewachsen" - direkt nach der Natur. Man könnte auch sagen: die Wiedergabe ersetzt und verdrängt das Original / die Natur.

    Peter Friese 1991

    Categories

    Performance

    Polaroid camera, Polaroid film

    The Polaroid photo of a tree is hung among the branches of the same tree. The tree is photographed again, and the second Polaroid is also hung in the branches. The process is repeated five times.

    A photo work of the same title is realized on the basis of the performance (613).

    Realisation

    Musée d'Histoire Naturelle, Paris 1971

    Bibliography

    I: Darmstadt 1973, pp. 114-120. Karlsruhe 1975a, pp. 14, 120-121. Paris 1975a, pp. 13, 54. Bielefeld 1981, p. 10, 90. Essen 1991, p. 4. Bolzano 1999, p. 114

    Access general bibliography

    My name is Jochen Gerz