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O n 17 October, Sotheby’s is thrilled to inaugurate its new Paris headquarters with the extraordinary collection of Jörg Schellmann, which features key works by Joseph Beuys. Spanning from 1970 to 1986, many of the works in this collection arose from Beuys’s close collaboration with Jörg Schellmann. This collection stands out not only for its extraordinary artistic value but also because of the close relationship between Schellmann and Beuys, who collaborated frequently over the years. Here, Beuys’s gallerist Thaddeus Ropac reminisces on the artist and his collaborations.
Who was Jörg Schellmann?
Jörg Schellmann was a German publisher who opened a gallery in Munich in 1969 and worked with numerous artists, including Andy Warhol, Donald Judd, Keith Haring, Christo and Jeanne-Claude, publishing their prints and multiples. He also collaborated with Joseph Beuys, in particular on the production of objects, lithographs and photographic prints. This was an essential component of Joseph Beuys’s work, moreso than for other contemporary artists, allowing his work to reach a wide audience. Jörg Schellmann was also involved in the publication of the catalogue raisonné of Beuys’s editions.
How did you come to meet?
I met Jörg Schellmann in 1982 during Documenta 7, when I participated in Joseph Beuys’s project, 7000 Eichen (“7000 Oaks”).
The Schellmann Collection includes a number of marvels, like the two Fluxus objects included in the vitrine Requiem of Art (1973) or Drei Honiggefäße mit Kupferklammer (Honey Bowls with Copper Clamp) (1977). The collection also includes works in felt, Beuys’s preferred material alongside copper, honey, blood and fat.
These elements allude to Joseph Beuys’s memories of his airplane accident during the Second World War and to the way wool and fat allowed him to survive extreme cold. Consequently, Beuys attributed an existential meaning to these materials in his subsequent work. For the whole length of his career, he used them to create, among other things, biographical display cases that he called “individual mythologies.” Other works recall his political engagement and his performances.
What are your favorite works?
It is difficult to choose from this impressive collection. I particularly love the 140 prints after Leonardo da Vinci’s Codices Madrid. Included in this selection are two rare photographs by Beuys.
But how important are the photographs by other artists (Abisag Tüllman, Ute Klophaus)? Are they visual records of performances or do they have artistic value as works themselves?
Ute Klophaus’s photographs constitute invaluable documentation of Titus Andronus/Iphigenia, one of the most important of Joseph Beuys’s performance, which took place at the Theater am Turm in Frankfurt on 30 May 1969. Beuys, dressed in his fur coat, appeared in the darkness in front of a white horse, to which he seemed to be reading. The writer Peter Handke, very struck by this incredible performance, wrote about it in the German weekly Die Zeit.
In your galleries in Salzburg, Paris, London and Seoul, you have shown the work of Beuys many times. What is it about his work that particularly appeals to you? Is it the biographical aspect or rather his reflection on life?
From our first meeting, I was very impressed by the charisma of Joseph Beuys – a gift that is evident in the accounts of his often-dramatic performances – but also by the intensity of his work and by his social engagement. What particularly touched me was the way he reconceived of sculpture as “social sculpture,” a form of art capable of transforming society. He had a major influence on my choices and on my life. For me, the second part of the 20th century was marked by two exceptional artists: Marcel Duchamp and Joseph Beuys. Duchamp revolutionized the art world with his ironic conceptual practice and Beuys expanded the definition of art itself, staking out its role in activating political consciousness and stimulating social change.
Originally published in 83 Magazine. Translated from French by writer and art historian Marina Molarsky-Beck.
