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Lothar Wolleh (Berlin, 1930 - London, 1979) is a German photographer who became well-known primarily because of his intensive contacts in the international avant-garde art scene. From 1963 to 1979, he portrayed dozens of prominent artists, the first of whom was Lucio Fontana.

Based in Düsseldorf, the young photographer first concentrated on the Rhineland art scene, portraying artists such as Günther Uecker (1963), Otto Piene (1964) and Gerhard Richter (1966), without however losing sight of European icons such as René Magritte (1967). His work has such intensity and character that his photographs have often become the most frequently used portraits of his portrayed subjects.

However, to depict Wolleh as a mere reporter or portrait photographer would be a major mistake. The artist's true life’s work is an all-encompassing project that consists of encounters, actions and collaborations. Wolleh is a connecting figure. The portrayed artists themselves also set to work with the photographs that Wolleh sends them. They carry out interventions on the work: Fontana perforates them, Uecker paints on them or drives nails through them, and Richter integrates pictorial fragments taken from the photos into his monumental canvases.

Wolleh’s collaboration with Joseph Beuys eventually proved to be one of the most intense. The artist produced hundreds of images of Beuys, taken during performances, lectures and exhibitions. Together, they also created "das Unterwasserbuch" (The Underwater Book), a publication made of printed PVC sheets, of which one copy can be found on the ocean floor, together with one of Beuys' torches. The individual pages, some of which have been worked on by Beuys, have become highly desirable collectors' items.

On the occasion of Joseph Beuys' 100th birthday on 12 May 2021, much international attention is also focused on Lothar Wolleh. In this INBOX exhibition, however, the focus lies on the interaction between Wolleh and the artists who unleashed a true revolution in the arts during the period 1958-1962 in, among others, the Hessenhuis in Antwerp. A selection from the archives of the Lothar Wolleh Estate brings together an impressive series of treated portraits of these Hessenhuis artists.

In addition to collaborative works by Lothar Wolleh and Pol Bury, Lucio Fontana, Vic Gentils, Heinz Mack, Christian Megert, Günther Uecker, Georges Vantongerloo and Jef Verheyen respectively, the exhibition also features photographs that Wolleh took of Armando, Enrico Castellani, Jan Hendrikse, Adolf Luther, Otto Piene, Jan Schoonhoven, J.R. Soto and Daniel Spoerri.

 

This exhibition was curated by Stijn Coppejans and realised with the cooperation of Antoon Melissen.

 

Parallel to this exhibition there is the exhibition “Joseph Beuys, Lothar Wolleh – Wer nicht denken will fliegt raus!” from 13.05 until 17.07.2021 at Coppejans Gallery (Falconplein 17/19 – 2000 Antwerp).

Full program: www.100jaarBeuys.be

 

Partners 100 jaar Beuys Project:

Antwerp Art / ArchiVolt, Antwerp / Coppejans Gallery, Antwerp / dasKULTURforum, Antwerp / De Cinema & De Studio, Antwerp / Goethe Institut, Brussels / Kerber Verlag, Berlin / Koninklijke Academie voor Schone Kunsten Antwerpen / Lothar Wolleh Estate, Berlin / M HKA / Stad Antwerpen

 

Book presentation (recorded interview with Antoon Melissen, can be seen on the flat screen at the entrance of the INBOX space):

“Joseph Beuys – Lothar Wolleh: The Unterwasserbuch Project”

Antoon Melissen (ed.)

Kerber Verlag, two books in a cassette, English/German Edition, 101 ill.

• Book 1: Reprint artist’s book, 64 pages
• Book 2: An essay by Antoon Melissen, 80 pages

Design Stephan Holitschke, Büro für Visuelle Identitäten, München

Published in conjunction with the Lothar Wolleh Raum, Berlin

The book is for sale at € 40 in the M HKA shop.

 

In January 1971, Joseph Beuys (Krefeld, 1921–Düsseldorf, 1986) had his first museum exhibition outside the German-speaking world, at the Moderna Museet in Stockholm. Photographer Lothar Wolleh accompanied Beuys to Stockholm and documented the setting up of this exhibition. These photos formed the basis of an exceptional project, an artist’s book composed under both their names that ultimately attained fame under the title Unterwasserbuch (Underwater Book).

This publication contains the re-edition of this artist’s book, the first part of this cassette. The second part of this cassette reconstructs the rich, wondrous history of ‘Project Unterwasserbuch’ with previously unpublished photographs, sketches, concepts and correspondence. Together, these books chart the tribulations of Joseph Beuys’s and Lothar Wolleh’s ‘Unterwasserbuch project’. They are an imprint of the creative discourse of the early 1970s, but they equally tell the story of two kindred spirits.

 

Online video lecture

“Joseph Beuys - The Eurasian”

by Nav Haq, associate director M HKA

from 12.05 (20u) until 19.05.2021

on www.decinema.be

Joseph Beuys was an artist of the post-war avant-garde who sought to problematise the historical separation of the “West” from the “East” by creating a new reconciliatory Eurasian worldview. Believing in Eurasia as a plurality of culture that has facilitated the movement of people, objects and ideas, he wished for an open space without physical or ideological boundaries. Beuys was active in Antwerp during the 1960s and 1970 through his engagement with the seminal gallery Wide White Space, where he also made his renowned performance Eurasianstab (Eurasian Staff) in 1968. Marking his 100th birthday, this event considers Beuys as the embodiment of the anti-Modern, rethinking our relations to culture, nature and politics through his art and actions.