German Art World

The misunderstandings still haven't been laid to rest, even after six exhibitions. When the Leipzig Galerie für Zeitgenössische Kunst (i.e. Gallery of Contemporary Art, GfZK) launched its controversial exhibition series “Carte Blanche,” the reaction was public outrage and turbulent disputes.



The gallery was accused of selling out and of naiveté to the point of irresponsibility. “The title really hasn't been a help,” as Barbara Steiner, director of the Leipzig Galerie für Zeitgenössische Kunst now concedes: “after all, giving someone ‘Carte Blanche’ means letting him do as he pleases. But this is not really the case, because we are the ones who set the rules of the game:” in any case, the eleven private actors who may each organise one exhibition according to his wishes have to have money: the exhibitions' overhead costs come to at least 20,000 euros, plus exhibition equipment, props and staffing. But not just anybody can pay to play here. The firms – among them two galleries – as well as the collectors, were selected with great care, with the aim of presenting different models of private commitment to art and opening them up for public discussion.

A precarious situation becomes a research project

For some time now it has been no secret that private collectors, gallery owners, banks, sponsors and circles of art-loving friends have their say in what museums can purchase and exhibit, as their budgets have often shrunk to practically zero. People just don't talk about it. Or if they do, then in terms of the selfless beneficience of the loaners and donors, and of incorruptibly independent juries and acquisitions committees - a taboo that Leipzig's Galerie für Zeitgenössische Kunst has trampled underfoot.

The fact is that the GfZK, which opened in 1998 in a remodelled Wilhelminian villa and has come to identify itself as a museum of post-1945 art that shows and publicises national and international artistic positions, has a budget problem. The tenth anniversary of the founding of the "private-public partnership" between a private group of sponsors, the City of Leipzig and the State of Saxony that made this unique east German institution possible in the first place, has also witnessed its dysfunctionality. The budget of the gallery, which was turned into a foundation in 2002, has not even been increased enough to keep pace with the rate of price increases. The private sponsors' group, represented by the industrialist Arend Oetker, would be willing to do so if the partners from the public sector would do their part. But that is the crux of the matter, says Steiner, a native of Austria: rising overhead costs cannot be absorbed by increasingly bureaucratic sponsoring programmes. Therefore, turning the gallery's precarious situation into a research project is more than just a daring idea to save the immediate situation. In this way, time is being gained to address fundamental questions involving not only the gallery's own future, but also that of other museums.

Key questions

But Barbara Steiner points out that what is really troubling now is the fact that private backers are increasingly losing interest in public institutions, preferring to set up their own museums instead. Another taboo: who will have the final say when public authorities withdraw and firms and collectors prefer to invest in their own premises for art? Topics for discussion are being collected via an Internet forum entitled GfZK-3.

At half-time, things are as follows: for a year now, exhibitions have been shown that would have been unthinkable before, art can be seen that would have been out of the question, and a highly diverse public is turning up for the shows. Some say the gallery is losing its profile, others say good riddance. But in the discussions the decisive questions are being avoided. The project is proving to be tricky: how much leeway is there for criticising guests who are also financial backers?

No public exposure of conflicts of interest

During the first exhibition, a local IT firm took stock: it has been financing an award for southeastern European artists, including being exhibited in the gallery, for five years now. In the meantime, a few of these artists have established themselves on the market. In the second exhibition, the Leipziger Volkszeitung, a local newspaper, presented its award winners. The fact that not only already purchased works, but current ones were shown, was advantageous for the artists. But the collection's profile was still not all that clear. The collectors, Herr and Frau Oetker, presented their personal art collection, which was curated in a very sophisticated fashion. Nonetheless, Herr Oetker, an industrialist who had helped finance the gallery from the beginning, did not let himself be coaxed out of his reserve. The Leipzig gallery, Galerie Dogenhaus, placed the elaborate installations of its house artist, Julius Popp, that adapt modern information technologies, in a dialogue with the finely contoured schemata of the American artist, Mark Lombardi, in which he researches connexions among politics, finance capital and terrorism. But one issue that was not subjected to critical scrutiny was the gaining and enhancement of prestige as the unquestioned aim of such presentations outside of one's own premises. Here, too, no one wanted to go public with conflicts of interest.

Empty spaces remain

If, as has been announced, the gallery Galerie Eigen + Art next plans to show the strategies with which it will take part in art fairs, Art Basel Miami Beach will no longer be present. It has just been made known that Carte Blanche XI, the final exhibition, might well be left empty. The collectors Herr and Frau Schmittens no longer wish to participate – due both to costs and the continuing criticism of the project as a whole. Whether new understandings for possible cooperation between public museums and private firms are emerging is still an open question. Answers will have to come no later than in the planned final publication.