Helmut und Johana Kandl – „always the best“ | text by Reinhard Braun, 2013
Religiosity, historical constructions, capitalism – the art of Helmut and Johanna Kandl can be understood as an attempt to expose all these as myths, to distort them to the point, as it is neatly put, that they become recognisable. “economy is not the big thing” is the message on one painting, where oversized legs in stockings hover above an isolated and lonely group of three men, hanging over their heads like a Damocles sword of unfulfilled and unfulfillable dreams. And of course this claim is absurd, for meanwhile almost everyone knows the famous remark made by Bill Clinton during his successful presidential campaign of 1992: “It’s the economy, stupid!” – One of those remarkable sayings (initially coined for internal usage by his campaign team) capable of encapsulating an entire ideology.
Text and picture mostly contradict one another in Johanna Kandl’s paintings; they are in principle mutually exclusive or comment on one another in a manner that is almost below-the-belt. The blessings of the post/neo-liberal world are evoked through slogans while their hollowness and mendacity are marked through sketchily painted situations, situations taking place in the economic, social and cultural margins of this world: black markets, petty trading, scrap yards, begging. These constellations of picture and text impose a degree of superficiality even onto the critical language of their questioning, a kind of compelled platitude. “Everyone is a potential winner” is the message of one scene, which seems to be located between a black market and a refugee camp – but exactly that, only potentially; it is nothing other than an abstract possibility, not even a likely option. But this sarcasm does not even stem from any exaggeration or hyperbole by the artist – the everyday lives of so many people are strung up between these poles of rhetoric and reality, between ideology and “naked life”. In a way, Johanna Kandl’s paintings are full of “infamous” people as Michel Foucault once described it: the everyday person, the any-old person whose life normally remains undocumented, attracts no attention, until suddenly they are “snatched out of darkness” by a news report, by a police investigation, a court trial (or a work of art). It is a person confronting power…and they find themselves confronted by this power in the form of language as well.
“Contemporary hardship and suffering are fragmented, dispersed and scattered; and so is the dissent which they spawn”, writes Zygmunt Bauman in his work In Search of Politics. And the pictures of Helmut and Johanna Kandl are full of crises, of dispersion, of the disintegration of the social, of poverty, flight, instability and political powers that induce and are adept in exploiting this dispersion. This crack emerges potentially in precisely the contradiction between what we read and what we see.
Jacques Rancière has written that the political already begins when describing what is referred to as a conflict or crisis. Helmut and Johanna Kandl provide detailed and clear descriptions of the political terrains which traverse our societies – not just “our” Western societies, saturated and commercialised as they are, but also those on the peripheries of Europe, the Balkans and where the Caucuses begin: those countries whose political, economic and cultural antagonisms are perpetuated and instrumentalised so as to maintain the advantages enjoyed by the so-called “First World”. The works do not deal with the societies in an abstract sense, nor are they stylised or even invented (no matter how plausible); what is related rather are very concrete scenes which both artists have experienced on their extensive travels between Lithuania and Azerbaijan, Serbia and the Ukraine. These are concrete scenes, concrete places, concrete circumstances which are depicted and confronted with a mythical rhetoric of prosperity and success.
This interest in the concrete goes hand in hand with an interest in the (infamous?) people they encounter on their travels, the people they speak with, the people who tell them their stories. Communication takes place, invitations are made, sometimes gifts exchanged. Events are brought about, social spaces – very limited, uncertain, always still hierarchical – arise; no “research” is conducted. Coincidental – but not irrelevant – encounters are strung together, are passed on, form a chain…as we can read for Fluchtbild: “On the way from Berlin to Vienna I took a wrong turn in the Czech Republic and ask for directions in a tavern. / At the bar I meet a young gypsy. / I dye my hair black and roam around with him.”
A moment of this individualisation of social reality lights up, as it were, when in a video work (Kleine Freuden des Alltags) we can watch how Johanna Kandl, slipping into the role of her mother – the family once owned its own paint store in Vienna –, reads the bankruptcy notice in the newspaper with a malicious glee. This private joy at the looming social dislocation, the failures of the economy, is also one of those moments in which the myth crumbles, the myth spun by advertising, envisioned by career plans, harbouring hopes of success, but also the myth of beauty and affirming the competitive society in which we live. Another “text picture” takes the same line, presenting a kind of gossip and envy picture: “Brad Pitt molests young men in the loo of Berlin’s Zoo Station. / Ingvar Kamprad has a penchant for old German furniture.” And of course the image may be turned around the other way: “Ai Wei Wei hawks around his criticism of China. / I’ve had it up to here with the works of Bernd and Hilla Becher.”
What also finds expression in these text pictures is the associative mode of working, taking leaps and making connections – it is as if someone gets carried away when telling a story and starts rambling. In this respect it is perhaps more accurate to speak of language rather than text pictures; or indeed of story pictures which enable a position of speaking to become understandable, a subject that speaks and thus opens up a potential space of communication with viewers. Because they are mainly assertions or obvious fictions (“I was kidnapped in Mexico. / No one is willing to pay the ransom. / I now do the cooking for the terrorists”), these pictures also entangle us in a contradiction, prompting us to contradict and claim we don’t believe them – just like we cannot believe the stories of happiness and wealth.
To detect the moments which are a visible expression of how the system predominantly produces failure, these moments of the dysfunctional, of stepping-out-of-order, are conceivably the focal point of the work of Helmut and Johanna Kandl.
Like two detectives they track down these traces of evidence and connect them into a kind of counter-narrative. All these incidents, which are never taken up into the official history or ideology (or at least are suppressed within the scope of these ideologies and histories, but this is never completely successful…), are collected, concentrated and strung together – they reveal an alarming and horrifying scene of failed social plans and projects. Here it does not help when on another language/ text picture the claim is made that the artists have lots of friends and interesting commissions: “We’re very popular amongst the important people. We’re photographed often. Everyone laughs when we tell jokes. Those who don’t like us aren’t really important. Actually, people who don’t like us don’t exist. We’re photographed often. We’re photographed often by important photographers. The wrinkles are masked out…” This self-assurance as to their own importance also contradicts their practice of placing themselves on the fringes of social space, to find, occupy and represent these margins, i.e. to a certain degree marginalise oneself. And by no means does the same kind of visibility reign in these margins that prevails in the much more glamorous centres, where the “goddesses of trade, merciless and cruel”, never sleep. On the contrary: these margins are pervaded with a shame about becoming visible, they are characterised by eyes looking down, and a peculiar non-perception permeates these spaces.
In exposing the unquestioned grounds of historical myths and meta-narratives, in adding and amending, commentating and closing gaps, Helmut and Johanna Kandl demonstrate that everything holds onto everything else, that justifications, narratives, images and memory mutually construct one another – and thus cannot be simply randomly re-arranged. The visibility of one determines the invisibility of the others. There is no inevitable opposition between official and individual history, and it is most certainly not their concern to convey an idea of the authenticity of poverty and social isolation, or to articulate a politics of identity for the purpose of saving subjectivity, restored as it were via the pictures. Rather, the concern seems to be the entanglement of one with the other. Both are always already there and always potent, in relationship to one another and they mutually determine one another. At the same time though, both are not equally visible or sayable, they do not share in the same way and to the same degree in the collective space of narrating history, the construction of meaning and value. The works of Helmut and Johanna Kandl are not political in what they show, or thanks to the language with which they confront what they show. They are not counter-pictures. If we are honest, we hardly see anything that we do not already know – but in what way are we shocked about it? It is thus not about the – unsurprising – subject matter; politics takes place in the dispute about what is given to the senses, about what is visible, about the manner in which it is sayable, and about who can say it. (Jacques Rancière). Above all, it is about creating new spaces for dissent about the connection and order of these disparate economic, political, social and cultural spaces (which are not subject to some unalterable law), for stating doubt, for the possibility of expression, challenging realities, or at least enriching them, perhaps even to make them incomprehensible, although the message appears to be so simple and obvious: “always the best”.
ARTISTS
Johanna Kandl
born 1954 in Vienna (A)
Helmut Kandl
born 1953 in Laa/Thaya (A)
Exhibitions and projects (2004-2014, selection)
2014
Nachbilder, Galerie für Zeitgenössische Kunst Leipzig, Leipzig (hjk) (D)
2013
Bussmann, Kandl, Strobl, Galerie Altnöder, Salzburg (A) (jk)
…liberty and the pursuit of happiness, Galerie Zimmermann Kratochwill, Graz (hjk)(A)
dispari & dispari, Reggio Emilia (jk,G) (ITA)
Mit Vorsatz – Arbeiten im Öffentlichen Raum, Museumsquartier Wien (hjk,P) (A)
D.E.V.E Galerie Moskau, Stella Art Foundation, Moskau (hjk,G) (RUS)
EISBRECHER: LENIN in Murmansk, Special Project Moskau Biennale, Murmansk (hjk) (RUS)
Sommerbilder, Essl Museum, Klosterneuburg (jk, G) (A)
Het Karakter van een collectie, Museum van Hedendaagse Kunst, Antwerpen (jk,G) (BE)
Wir holen uns das Goldene Vlies, Galerie Lisi Hämmerle, Bregenz (hjk, P) (A)
Maria breit den Mantel aus, Galerie im Körnerpark, Berlin (hjk, P) (D)
Viewpoints on Folklore, Austrian Cultural Forum London (hjk, G) (GB)
De Colline en Colline – Art et Citoyen, Tunis (hjk, G) (TN)
Artists in Multi Functions, Lalit Kala Akademi, New Delhi (jk, G) (IN)
2012
You only live twice, Camera Austria in Kooperation mit dem Steirischen Herbst, Graz (hjk, P) (A)
Wunder, Kunsthalle Krems (hjk, G) (A)
L´Éducation de Rosette, Schloss Harmannsdorf (hjk, G) (A)
Common History and Its Private Stories. Geschichte und Geschichten, Sofia Art Gallery (jk, G) (BG)
Absolut Wien. Ankäufe und Schenkungen seit 2000, Wien Museum (jk,G) (A)
What happened to God?, Halle 14 Baumwollspinnerei, Leipzig (hjk, G) (D)
Our haus, Austrian Cultural Forum New York (jk, G) (USA)
Meet me at the Park, Fundacja Salony, Zielona Gora (hjk, P) (POL)
Es lebe die Malerei, Sammlung Essl, Klosterneuburg (jk, G) (A)
2011
Tolerabilis, Toskanische Säulenhalle / Zeughaus, Augsburg (hjk, G) (A)
Zonen – prekär, Kunstsaele Berlin (hjk, G) (D)
Interventionen, Theater Akzent, Wien (hjk, G) (A)
Untold Stories, SOKOL Malopalska Culture Center, Nowy Sacz (jk, G) (POL)
Wunder, Deichtorhallen, Hamburg (hjk, G) (D)
Generation 1951 +-, Galerie Altnöder, Salzburg (jk, G) (A)
What happened to God?, ACC Galerie, Weimar (hjk, G) (D)
Other possible world, Neue Galerie für Bildende Kunst, Berlin (jk, G) (D)
Aires de jex, champs de tensions: figures de la photographie urbaine en Europe depuis les années 1970, Pavillon Populaire – Galerie d´Art Photographique, Montpellier (hk, G) (F)
Cities on the River, Slovenská Vytvarná Ùnia – Slovak Union of Visual Arts (hjk, G) (SK)
Cities on the River, Magazin, Belgrad (hjk, G) (SRB)
2010
Glück & Co, Galerie Altnöder, Salzburg (hjk, P) (A)
Materialien, Filme, Relikte – eine Doku zum „Marienbaum“, museumOrth, Orth an der Donau (hjk, P) (A)
Owl Stretching Time, Galerie Nordenhake, Berlin (jk, G) (D)
BLICKWECHSEL – österreichische Fotografie heute, Galerie Westlicht, Wien (hjk, G) (A)
You never know what will happen next…, Lentos – die Sammlung 1900-2010, Linz (jk, G) (A)
Over the Counter, Müscarnok KH, Budapest (hjk, G) (H)
FAQ SERBIA, Austrian Cultural Forum, New York (jk, G) (USA)
How many breads do You have, Glasfenster – Permanentinstallation, St. Andrä Kirche, Graz (jk) (A)
Viel Glück und Erfolg!, Städtische Galerie, Nordhorn (hjk, G) (D)
Cities on the River, Városi Müvészeti Múzeum, Györ (hjk, G) (H)
2009
WERK NU, Z33. House of Contemporary Art, Hasselt (jk, P) (BE)
Marienbaum, Permanent-Installation in Herrnbaumgarten (hjk) (A)
Wächterhaus, Permanentinstallation in Aflenz (hjk) (A)
6. Biennale Fotografii – fotografia / ideologia / polityka, Biennale für Fotografie Poznan (jk, P) (POL)
The Missing Guardian, Galerie Christine König, Wien (jk, P) (A)
Snipers on the Market, Galerie Kisterem, Budapest (hjk, P) (H)
1989: The End of History or the Beginning of the Future?, Austrian Cultural Forum, New York (jk, G) (USA)
Gemeinsam in die Zukunft, Frankfurter Kunstverein, Frankfurt am Main (jk, G) (D)
Common History and Its Private Stories. Geschichte und Geschichten, MUSA, Wien (jk, G) (A)
Nichtorte, Orte. Sammlungsausstellung 2009, Galerie für Zeitgenössische Kunst Leipzig (jk, G) (D)
selected: 10 YEARS OF <rotor>, <rotor> , Graz (hk, G) (A)
2008
ZWISCHEN DEN WELTEN, Österreichisches Kulturforum, Warschau (hjk, G) (POL)
Bild fliegt, Galerie Patrick Ebensperger, Graz (hjk, P) (A)
Womit verdienen Sie Ihren Lebensunterhalt?, <rotor>, Graz (hjk, G) (A)
Be A Happy Worker: Work-To-Rule!, Galerija Miroslav Kraljevic, Zagreb (hjk, G) (HRV)
erzählt: Moment – Begebenheit – Mythos., NÖ Dukumentationszentrum für Moderne Kunst, St. Pölten (hjk, G) (A)
Experimenta FOLKLORE, Frankfurter Kunstverein, Frankfurt am Main (jk, G) (D)
orientalism & Ephemera, Kenerdine Art Gallery, Saskatoon (jk, G) (SK)
orientalism & Ephemera, Vancouver International Center for Asian Art, Vancouver (jk, G) (CAN)
2007
5+5, Center of Contemporary Art Monte Negro, Podgorica (hjk, G) (MNE)
Volksgarten – Die Politik der Zugehörigkeit, Kunsthaus, Graz (hjk, G) (A)
Geography is dead, Kunstverein Dortmund (hjk, P) (D)
Große Malerei. Im Zeichen der Lentos-Sammlung, Lentos, Linz ((jk, G) (A)
the painting of modern life, Hayward Gallery, London (jk, G) (GB)
Deutsche Geschichten, Galerie für Zeitgenössische Kunst Leipzig (jk, G) (D)
orientalism & Ephemera, Ottawa Art Gallery, Ottawa (jk, G) (CAN)
Who´s got the Big Picture?, Museum voor Hedendaagse Kunst, Antwerpen (jk, G) (BE)
simultan, Fotomuseum Winterthur, Winterthur (hk, G) (CH)
2006
Equal and Less Equal, Museum on the Seam, Jerusalem (hjk, G) (IL)
Neuhausener und andere Geschichten, Kunstverein Neuhausen (hjk, P) (D)
Kämpfer, Träumer & Co., Lentos, Linz (hjk, P) (D)
Backstage – Eisener Vorhang, Akzent Theater, Wien (hjk) (A)
How to Do Things? – In the Middle of (No)Where, Kunstraum Kreuzberg / Bethanien, Berlin (jhk, G) (D)
dr´hoim isch dr´hoim…, Kunstverein Ludwigsburg (hjk, G) (D)
GESCHICHTE(N) VoR oRT – Eine Ausstellung rund um den Volkertplatz, Kunst im Öffentlichen Raum, Wien (hjk, G) (A)
Arbeitswelten (2001-2005), Museum in Progress, Wien (hjk, G) (A)
simultan, Museum der Moderne, Salzburg (hjk, G) (A)
Zurück zur Figur – Malerei der Gegenwart, Kunsthalle der Hypo -Kulturstiftung, München (jk, G) (D)
Österreich: 1900-2000, Sammlung Essl, Klosterneuburg (jk, G) (A)
SCHARFES AUGE, Galerie Christine König, Wien (jk, G) (A)
Die Postmediale Kondition, Neue Galerie Graz, (jk, G) (A)
IR/REAL, Sammlung Essl, Klosterneuburg (jk, G) (A)
Academy, Museum voor Hedendaagse Kunst, Antwerpen (jk, G) (BE)
Archiving Fever, Adam Art Gallery, Wellington (hk, G) (NZ)
Die Heimat ist um die Ecke, Historisches Museum, Ulm (hk, G) (D)
2005
Ajnstain, NOVI SAD – a tribute to Mileva Maric-Einstein, Einstein Forum, Potsdam (hjk, G) (D)
business as usual, Österreichisches Kulturforum, Prag (hjk, P) (CZ)
Helmut & Johanna Kandl, Galerie Altnöder, Salzburg (hjk, P)
I Sell Paintigs What Do You Sell?, Galerie Christine König, Wien (jk, P) (A)
an/sammlung – an/denken, Museum für Volkskunde, Wien (hjk, G) (A)
an/sammlung – an/denken, Museum Carolino Augusteum, Salzburg (hjk, G) (A)
The Need to Document, Kunsthaus Baselland, Basel (jk, G) (CH)
Slices of Life – Blueprints of the Self in Painting, Austrian Cultural Forum, New York (jk, G) (USA)
Urbane Malerei, Galerie für Zeitgenössische Kunst Leipzig (jk, G) (A)
Die Heimat ist um die Ecke, Museo de Arte Contemporanea de Vigo (hk, G) (ESP)
2004
Haus der Frauen, Kunstverein Langenhagen (hjk, P) (D)
Kämpfer fürs Glück, Kunstverein Ulm (hjk, P) (D)
From Bagdad to Babylon, Austrian Cultural Forum, London (hjk, P) (GB)
Personal View, Artget Gallery Culture Center, Belgrad (hjk, G) (SRB)
New Enterprises, FLUC, Wien (hjk, P) (A)
Urlaubsfotos – gesammelt von H.+J. Kandl, Galerie für Zeitgenössiche Kunst Leipzig (hjk, P) (D)