Klaus Hähner-Springmühl

Klaus Hähner-Springmühl (* 1950 in Zwickau ; † July 15, 2006 in Leipzig ) was one of the most influential artistic personalities in the independent GDR scene in the 1980s . During this time he lived and worked in Karl-Marx-Stadt (today Chemnitz ).

life and work

Hähner-Springmühl completed an apprenticeship as a bricklayer with a high school diploma ( vocational training with high school diploma ), broke off an engineering degree, and immediately afterwards began to discover collective artistic forms of work for himself in the 1970s. The meeting with AR Penck , whose stylistics of the drawings he took up as well as the character of actions and performances, was essential for him .

In 1972 he moved to Karl-Marx-Stadt, which in the 1970s and 1980s held a certain exceptional position in the GDR in the visual arts and in the theater in Berlin . Even his first exhibitions in the city turned into veritable scandals, although his images were less provocative than his appearance. In the 1980s he cultivated his typical style, in which photo overpainting and drawings dominated. Expanded through performances and concerts, Hähner-Springmühl had a massive influence on the young art scene in Karl-Marx-Stadt / Chemnitz, from which sustainable talents such as the brothers Carsten Nicolai and Olaf Nicolai sprang up until the early 1990s . This younger generation - like Hähner-Springmühl's circle in Saxony - carefully observed his art and, to a certain extent, also evaluated it for their own work.

Despite the travel ban, Hähner-Springmühl's work was not unknown in the West either. In 1985 the book “Commentary” was published, which was created in collaboration with Heiner Müller . This is remarkable insofar as the cult author usually only worked on projects like this with colleagues he saw at eye level. With his solo exhibition "Construction Pit II" in 1988 in the project gallery EIGEN + ART by Gerd Harry Lybke , Hähner-Springmühl finally reached its artistic and popular zenith. His most important artistic partners in the 1980s were Frank Raßbach, Erich-Wolfgang Hartzsch and his divorced wife Gitte Hähner-Springmühl .

The time after the reunification and peaceful revolution in the GDR was a way to forget and leave behind. Mostly closed to commercial considerations, he responded to the drastic changes in the art world by withdrawing. Since the mid-1990s he lived increasingly lonely and equally withdrawn in Leipzig. His last solo exhibition, which was arranged retrospectively due to the lack of new material, he had grounded in 2005 in the Chemnitz gallery , where he was also shown in public for the last time.

Klaus Hähner-Springmühl died on July 15, 2006 in Leipzig of cardiovascular failure .

Works by Klaus Hähner-Springmühl can be found in numerous public and private collections.

Exhibitions

• 2018/19: Klaus Hähner-Springmühl - candidate, retrospective, Museum of Fine Arts Leipzig
• 2013/14: "Richterstr. 9 - A homage to Klaus Hähner-Springmühl", Galerie Pankow, Berlin & Kunstsammlungen Chemnitz
• 2013: "Klaus Hähner-Springmühl", Künstlerhaus Bethanien, Berlin
• 2009: "Klaus Hähner-Springmühl - o. T.", Galerie am Domhof, Zwickau
• 2009: "Klaus Hähner-Springmühl: England is not the only island in the world", D21 Kunstraum, Leipzig

Since 1986: Numerous solo exhibitions and exhibition participations a. a. in the Galerie Oben, Karl-Marx-Stadt, the Galerie Barthel + Tetzner Berlin, as well as in museums and art associations

From 1990 to 2006 represented at the art fairs: ART BASEL , ART COLOGNE, ARCO Madrid , ART FRANKFURT, Kunstmarkt DRESDEN, KUNST-KÖLN, ART MULTIPLE Düsseldorf, ART Zurich by the gallery Barthel + Tetzner Berlin, Cologne, Chemnitz

Catalogs and books

• "Richterstr. 9 - A homage to Klaus Hähner-Springmühl" Galerie Pankow, Berlin 2013
• "Klaus Hähner-Springmühl" Künstlerhaus Bethanien, Berlin 2012
• "England is not the only island in the world - Klaus Hähner-Springmühl" Leipzig, D21 Kunstraum, 2010
• "Mass - 80 kg" Galerie Oben Karl-Marx-Stadt, 1987; 16 pages with numerous s./w. Fig.
• "Blickwechsel - 13 Artists from Saxony" Gallery Gunar Barthel Berlin + Gallery TransArt Exhibitions Cologne 1991; 32 p. With 26 ills.
• "Approach - Project Trübsbachberg" Galerie Barthel + Tetzner Cologne, Galerie Gunar Barthel Berlin, Galerie Oben Chemnitz and ART-CO Braunschweig 1992; 28 pages with 41 illus.
• "Klaus Hähner-Springmühl" Gallery Gunar Barthel Berlin and Gallery Oben Chemnitz 1992; 72 pages with 79 ills.

Web links

• Gallery Barthel + Tetzner Pictures
• Literature by and about Klaus Hähner-Springmühl in the catalog of the German National Library

Individual evidence