joseph beuys

Joseph Beuys was more activist than artist. His life work is less a series of paintings, videos and sculptures, and more an attempt at re-defining the boundaries of art, the processes through which is created, and the role it has in society. At the retrospective in the Hamburger Bahnhof Gallery, what stood out most for me were his words, which provided the framework and gave direction to an otherwise bitsy and slightly confusing exhibition.

For me it is the word that produces all images, it is the key sign for all processes of moulding and organinsing. 1976


We're living in a nomadic culture; the mind has to get by without a s t a b l e world view. 1964


As a matter of fact I was invented to keep making it clearer to people that politics shouldn't even be allowed to exist. 1983


* Every revolution begins with stupid questions. 1977 *


I'm not a gardener who plants trees because trees are beautiful. No, I say that today trees are much more intelligent than people. 1984



Every human being has to wear himself out. It'd be dreadful if he weren't worn out and then just died that way ...

... it'd be dreadful. 1985

Joseph Beuys. Die Revolution Sind Wir. Hamburger Bahnhof, Oct Nov 2008