Joseph Beuys, born on May 12, 1921 in Krefeld and raised in Kleve and Kranenburg, is the utopian of the 20th century. He wanted to redeem the world through art and demanded the creative participation of society. His questions about social philosophy and anthroposophy lead to an “expanded concept of art” and “social plastic” as a total work of art. His actions, installations, and performances, his pedagogy and politics are permeated by the idea of an aesthetically-ethical education of society. One can see this as an alternative to the experiences Beuys had in World War II. After the emergency high school diploma in 1941, he became a radio operator and air gunner, crashed over Crimea in 1944, and, after his recovery, arrived at the Western front as a parachutist, returning to the Lower Rhine in August 1945. The following year, he became a student at the Düsseldorf Art Academy.
In delicate poetic drawings as well as in enormous sculptures, objects, environments, films, and loud language works, Beuys created symbols of human existence. For the “Siberian Symphony” in 1963 in the Academy Auditorium, he first practiced the crossover of art, music, theater, and performance art. He played the piano, also acted with a dead hare, from which he eventually tore out the small heart. Death and life are closely intertwined in his art: “Death is the foundation. Whoever has not recognized it as central does not think.”
From 1961 to 1972, Beuys was a professor in Düsseldorf. His class produced the elite of artists: Katharina Sieverding, Jörg Immendorff, Imi Knoebel, and Reiner Ruthenbeck. The brilliant educator sought new forms of expression and materials, focusing on fat, felt, and copper for storing heat. He took his symbols from nature. Bees served as a sign of a perfectly functioning organism; he loved the hare because it makes sharp turns, and he saw the deer as the vulnerable animal.
The man with the hat was a revolutionary spirit. In 1967, he founded the German Student Party, for the benefit of a “truly Christian world.” In 1971, he developed the “Organization for Direct Democracy through Referendum.” In 1973, the association for the promotion of a Free International University for Creativity and Interdisciplinary Research was added. In 1976, he ran as an independent for the Bundestag, and in 1979, he became a founding member of the Greens. Nevertheless, he failed in his attempt to integrate politics into art. At documenta 6, he set up a honey pump in the stairwell in 1977, channeling the circulating nectar to the exhibition room: a symbolization of the life cycle.
In 1972, Beuys was expelled from the Düsseldorf Art Academy because he disregarded admission restrictions, considered every person an artist, and welcomed them into his class. Independent of such contemporary political squabbles, which ended in his favor, works of existential significance began to emerge. The Scala Napoletana, a freely suspended “Neapolitan ladder” on two lead balls, glides toward the sky yet is held to the earth by iron strings. “Palazzo Regale” presents two glass vitrines with the relics of his actions. Brass plates, which he finished with varnish and gold dust so that their shine is dimmed, hang on the walls. The surroundings blur, and the viewer is thrown back onto themselves. The magical space in the NRW Art Collection is the legacy of the visionary Beuys, who died on January 23, 1986. His ashes were given to the North Sea.
