Heinz Gappmayr

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Heinz Gappmayr (born October 7, 1925 in Innsbruck ; † April 19, 2010 there ) was an Austrian visual artist . He is regarded as an important representative of concrete and visual poetry .

Life

From the late 1950s onwards, Heinz Gappmayr developed an artistic concept that focused on language itself as an art object. His first publications and exhibitions already referred to the differences between concept, word and non-linguistic object: see sign 1962, 1964 first solo exhibition, 1973 first room texts, 1979 first photo texts. Gappmayr was also an important stimulator and source of inspiration in the collaboration with museums and galleries and, as a conversation partner for younger artists, he was in a lively exchange with the contemporary art scene far beyond Innsbruck. With his lectures he has contributed to the networking of the fields of science and art education.

Work and reception

Factory 0.0000000001 in Bregenz on a listed residential building

Heinz Gappmayr's work is based on extensive linguistic and artistic groundwork and links aspects of linguistic research, image theory and philosophy. The starting point was the endeavor to overcome the reference character of language to something outside of itself and to treat words and signs on a sheet of paper as a concrete thought reality. The materiality of the linguistic elements was subsequently expanded to include books, panels, walls and space and finally to public places, buildings and squares. In addition to the choice of terms, the choice and arrangement of words, lines or symbols is decisive for the individual work. Through their use as an art object, images of thought are created in which what is thought is visualized as a visual and ideal reality at the same time. Pictures here do without any representation of simulated content from the lifeworld, because they are symbols of concrete and generally applicable experiences. An important aspect is the activating role that the viewer has to play and who, through his physical and mental presence, creates the meaning of a work.

In order to give the materiality of the words even more independence, Gappmayr removes his poetry from the usual and well-known syntax structure and transfers it to the surface or space. “The surface has its own grammar. The surface makes it necessary to think the text in terms of it, so that its function can come into its own. ”The active task of the reader or viewer is specifically addressed here. There is no reading direction in the room, no right or wrong and no known grammar to fall back on. It has to be learned from scratch, just as children first have to learn the grammar of their mother tongue by observing and trying out.

By focusing on individual words, Gappmayr's well-known one-word texts emerge, which mostly have a metaphysical reference. There is no syntax structure in these texts because they either consist of one word alone, or the same word with different frequencies or variations of the same word. So they stand alone, without their core being obscured or covered by other words. The simple designation as a "sign" releases the words from their semantic load and allows a direct view of their core. The viewer must therefore question his supposed prior knowledge of the meaning of the terms and question them from the ground up. The space's own grammar is the context in which the terms appear, detached from the series of sentences known to the reader. “Words are made up of crooked and straight lines, like a drawing; but with them we associate a certain meaning. Our daily dealings with writing obscures our view of what is unusual about this phenomenon. "

The spatiality of Gappmayr's poems gives them a visual character that no longer turns them into texts alone, but into text images. So the terms “reader” and “viewer” cannot always be differentiated in this environment. You have to be both to experience the effect and materiality of language. In concrete / visual poetry, the written language conquers the area that was previously only assigned to the fine arts. The symbiosis between writing and image opens up a new view of the structure of the signs in our language, but also foreign ones. “Visual poetry makes visible how mere lines are transformed into signs that enable meaningful, logical world.” As a representative of a new generation of artists, Gappmayr emancipates the phenomenon of language away from the mere means of transporting information, knowledge and pure means of communication and gives it its own Meaningfulness. This does not arise from the semantic meaning within a syntactic series, but from the grammar of the words in the space itself. The lack of comparable patterns means that completely new approaches are developed and unknown elements of language are discovered. Gappmayr lets his readers learn the grammar of the language in space through trial and error, transfer it to everyday life and apply it. "The purpose of the new poetry is to give poetry an organic function in society again [...] through the exemplary nature of its rules of the game (the poet's note), the new poem can influence everyday language". Heinz Gappmayr's complete oeuvre includes, in addition to the more than 3000 visual text works, a large number of publications, graphic portfolios, photographic works [5], works in public spaces, articles and theoretical treatises.

Awards

Publications

  • sign . Pinguin-Verlag, Innsbruck 1962.
  • sign II . Pinguin-Verlag, Innsbruck 1964.
  • sign III . visual poems. Edition UND by Jürgen Willing-Verlag, Munich 1968.
  • characters IV. visual poems . Sema-Verlag, Karlsruhe 1970.
  • numerical texts . Edition UND, Munich 1975.
  • space . Edition UND, Munich 1977.
  • reflex . Ottenhausen Verlag, Aachen 1978.
  • text installations . edition UND, Munich 1984.
  • room texts . Autumn press, Vienna 1990.
  • Area and space . Museum-Gallery, Bolzano 1991.
  • alphabet . Edition NN Oslip, Vienna 1993.
  • modifications . Cantz Verlag, Ostfildern 1995.
  • couleurs . Jean-Pierre Huguet editeur, Le Pré Battoire 1998.
  • photos . Folio Verlag, Vienna-Bozen 2001.
  • texts 1961-1968 . Ritter Verlag, Klagenfurt 2002.
  • text structures, Lindner Gallery, Vienna 2002.
  • Opus. Heinz Gappmayr. Complete index of the visual and theoretical texts 1961-1990 . Van der Koelen Verlag, Mainz 1993. ISBN 3-926663-91-X .
  • Opus. Heinz Gappmayr. Complete index of the visual and theoretical texts 1991-1996 . Chorus Verlag, Mainz 1997. ISBN 3-931876-15-2 .
  • Opus. Heinz Gappmayr. Complete index of the visual and theoretical texts 1997 - 2004 . Ed. Chorus Verlag, Mainz 2005. ISBN 3-931876-56-X .
  • Sketches drafts . Johann Widauer Gallery, Innsbruck 2005.
  • selection . With an afterword by Markus Klammer . Folio Verlag, Vienna-Bozen 2009. ISBN 978-3-85256-488-3 .

Exhibitions

  • 1963 Amsterdam, Stedelijk Museum, writing and image
  • 1964 Munich, Barerstraße 84, sign II , first solo exhibition
  • 1965 London, Institute of Contemporary Arts, Between Poetry and Painting
  • 1966 New York, The Something Else Gallery, The Arts in Fusion
  • 1969 Venice, La Biennale, Mostra di poesia concreta
  • 1970 Vienna, gallery next to St. Stephan
  • 1972 Bremerhaven, Cabinet for Current Art
  • 1982 Frankfurter Kunstverein
  • 1985 Bern, art gallery and art museum
  • 1988 Kassel, New Gallery
  • 1989 Mainz, Dorothea van der Koelen gallery
  • 1991 Bozen, Museum Gallery
  • 1991 Munich, State Gallery of Modern Art, Neue Pinakothek
  • 1993 Salzburg, Rupertinum
  • 1993 Vienna, Lindner Gallery
  • 1996 Kunsthaus Zug
  • 1997 Art Association Jena
  • 1997 Kunsthalle Wien
  • 1997 Art Gallery Budapest
  • 1997 Innsbruck, Johann Widauer Gallery
  • 2000 Innsbruck, State Museum Ferdinandeum
  • 2004 Berlin, Mies van der Rohe house
  • 2007 Rovereto, MaRT, La parola nell'arte
  • 2008 Innsbruck, Johann Widauer Gallery
  • 2008 Kunsthalle Wien
  • 2010 Innsbruck, Johann Widauer Gallery
  • 2016 Innsbruck, Johann Widauer Gallery

Works in public collections

  • Berlin, State Museums of Prussian Cultural Heritage, National Gallery, Kupferstichkabinett, Art Library
  • Bolzano, Museion, Museum of Modern Art
  • Bruxelles, Musée d'Art Moderne de Bruxelles
  • Chemnitz, art collections
  • Dresden, State Art Collections, Kupferstichkabinett
  • Göppingen, art gallery
  • Ingolstadt, Museum for Concrete Art
  • Innsbruck, Tyrolean State Museum Ferdinandeum
  • London, Victoria and Albert Museum
  • Munich, Neue Pinakothek
  • Munich, Lenbachhaus
  • New York, Museum of Modern Art, Library
  • Salzburg, Rupertinum
  • Stuttgart, State Gallery
  • Vienna, Albertina
  • Vienna, Museum of Applied Arts
  • Vienna, Museum of Modern Art
  • Würzburg, Museum im Kulturspeicher, Peter C. Ruppert Collection

Works in public space

Room text in the Vienna main library
  • Zug, Kunsthaus, is will , 1996
  • Bregenz, Rathausstrasse, 0.0000000001 , 1997
  • Graz, University Library, zeit , 1997
  • Meran, hospital, blue light blue white , 1999
  • Hünfeld, some , 2001
  • Innsbruck, Town Hall, IS, ARE , 2002
  • Graz, Austrian Sculpture Park, 2003
  • Vienna, main library, room texts , 2006
  • Krems, Danube University, light installation, 2007
  • Innsbruck, Hypo-Bank, figures , 2008
  • Innsbruck, Lodenareal, ZEIT , 2009

literature

Web links

Commons : Heinz Gappmayr  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d Anne Katrin Feßler: Heinz Gappmayr 1925–2010. The standard / print edition, April 21, 2010
  2. ↑ Patrizia Jilg: Heinz Gappmayr died. Pioneer of visual poetry. ORF Ö1 Kulturjournal, April 20, 2010
  3. ↑ A complete list of texts, publications and exhibitions in: Opus. Heinz Gappmayr . Verlag Dorothea van der Koelen, Mainz and Chorus-Verlag, Munich.
  4. ↑ Gomringer, Eugen (ed.), Concrete poetry: German-speaking authors . Stuttgart: 2001, Reclam
personal data
SURNAME Gappmayr, Heinz
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Austrian artist
DATE OF BIRTH October 7, 1925
PLACE OF BIRTH innsbruck
DATE OF DEATH April 19, 2010
Place of death innsbruck