Thomas Putze – Die Schrecken des Eises und der Finsternis - Performance

„All a man needs is a good guitar and a dark road.“ Bob Dylan

Sich als Pinguin verkleiden, dem Körper wie einer Plastik Material zufügen, in einen schweren schwarzen Gummischlauch schlüpfen, sich an der Wand reiben, bis sich ein weißer Bauch abzeichnet, auf Eisschollen hüpfend Blues spielen und dabei im Rhythmus mit dem am Gitarrenkopf befestigten Wischmopp das Schmelzwasser aufwischen. So ausgestattet wird man auch unter seinesgleichen einsam und fühlt sich ausgesetzt. Was treibt mich an, mich von der Gemütlichkeit eines durch Übereinkünfte flauschig weichen Umfelds zu verabschieden, um das Ab- oder gar Jenseitige zu suchen? Vielleicht nur der Argwohn gegenüber der eigenen lauen Zufriedenheit oder glaube ich noch an tatsächliche Entdeckungen, die ich machen könnte? Sind die weißen Flecken auf meiner Weltkarte die Chance für neue Lebensräume oder nur Schimmelflecken, die vergangene Abenteuer überwuchern?
Ob die Form der Performance als Instrument der Wahrheitsfindung taugt, hängt von meinem Mut ab, den Augenblick überhand nehmen zu lassen und Vorbereitetes notfalls über Bord zu werfen, um in der Spannung zwischen einsamem Akteur und Publikum etwas Energie und Erkenntnisse für das Weiterkommen zu gewinnen. Gleichzeitig entscheidet auch der einzelne Betrachter, der in der Überzahl zum Publikum wird, durch seine Aufmerksamkeit, ob der Augenblick so bedeutend werden kann, dass er es wert ist, ein Aktions-Kunstwerk, ein temporäres körper- und raumabhängiges Bild geheißen zu werden. Wenn alle Beteiligten sich darauf einlassen, könnte es magisch und gleichzeitig amüsant werden. Thomas Putze

Introduction to the performance "Die Schrecken des Eises und der Finsternis" by Thomas Putze by Dr Kathrin Reeckmann, 25.01.2014

Ladies and Gentlemen,

If you miss one of our vernissages, it's a shame because you won't be able to get to know the artist, but you can take comfort in the fact that the art is there for the time being and you will certainly find an opportunity to at least get to know it and find further information and pictures in the catalogue.

Today it's different: a performance is the most ephemeral art form of all - it only exists in the moment of its presentation. You, who have turned up in such large numbers today, know this. You have torn yourselves away from the breakfast table and newspaper and made your way through the cold to the site of the expedition that the artist Thomas Putze will be undertaking with us.

A performance is always an expedition:
A journey of discovery into a remote and unexplored region. Which blank spots on which map does Thomas Putze have in mind and how high is the risk of failure? Expedition leader Putze has plenty of experience in his profession. He has long accompanied his exhibitions with performances that draw on his experience as a draughtsman, sculptor, musician, mountaineer, theology student, teacher and human being. He has received prizes for this, he has turned his audience into accomplices, he has confused them and led them to spontaneous actions of help and suggestions for improvement.

A performance is always an action by an artist that only he himself can carry out:
He has developed it for a very specific situation, so it is place- and time-specific. The medium of the action is the artist himself. He does not play a role, does not represent a person, he does not perform theatre and cannot repeat an action, but is, so to speak, his own material and his own work of art. He does not tell a story, but exposes himself to an experiment. He deliberately seeks out borderline situations (these can be absurd, confusing, frightening, funny) from which he hopes to gain experiences, reactions and food for thought for himself and his audience.

Performances are now an integral part of art life, benefiting from the digitalisation of our age like no other art form.
While the production process of the artwork became the subject of art in the action paintings of Jackson Pollock in the 1950s, for example, artists and the audience became part of the action in the happenings of the 1960s, before performance became a widely practised art form in the 1970s. With the major retrospective of the artist Marina Abramovic two years ago at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, performance has finally entered the canon of art history.

In Thomas Putze's performance today, you will recognise elements of his sculptural work - such as the combination of different materials within a sculpture, you will recognise the shell that protects but also restricts some of his figures, you will recognise one of his favourite motifs - the penguin - and you will also recognise the sometimes desperate humour of the humanist Thomas Putze, with which he fights for that little bit of truth that he needs to carry on.

Thomas Putze's sculptures and performances are self-experiments whose goal is always realisation. An exhibition visitor recently described his effect as follows: "At first you think, oh how funny or nice, but then it immediately becomes existential and you have to tackle the really big issues."

The really big issues are the speciality of expedition leader Thomas Putze. For example, the question that we all ask ourselves again and again from the age of 45 at the latest, the question of the meaning of life: What am I doing all this for? What goals do I have? Are they worth the effort? Do they still mean something to me? Do I need new ones? Or to put it metaphorically: What am I living through the horrors of ice and darkness for - to take up the title of this event? For what, the reader of Christoph Ransmayr's book asks, did the members of the Austro-Hungarian Arctic expedition in the 1870s toil for two years under inhumane conditions? To discover new land, which they named Kaiser-Franz-Josef-Land in honour of their ruler - a rocky archipelago in the eternal ice, hostile and forbidding. Deranged souls, unimaginable physical torment for a little fame that quickly evaporates, for national honour that in real life was buried on the battlefields of the First World War at the latest. Was it worth it? Life writes the best punchlines: Just a few years after his return, the ambitious, even fanatical leader of the expedition no longer attaches any importance to the discovery of unknown lands and becomes - and this really happened - a painter! His fame as a painter of Arctic scenery far surpasses that of the explorer and is more enduring and tangible. As an old man, he returns honours and medals and longs to return to the eternal ice as a place of peace and nothingness.

Thomas Putze has chosen this chronicle of failure and searching as the title of his performance: He, too, leaves his comfort zone and embarks on an expedition into the offside, into the absurd. It remains to be seen what insights he will gain. We should join his journey, get involved in his experimental set-up, ignore superficial utilitarian thinking and simply be there. Thomas Putze once said in an interview: "Without dedication there is no pleasure and therefore no art. I am satisfied when this pleasure or fun is transferred to the audience as energy and feelings and thoughts are set in motion." So take this opportunity! Leave your certainties behind and take part in his expedition. It will definitely be worth it!

Dr Kathrin Reeckmann, 25.01.2014