Art Calendar, 27. December 2021 - by C. Mauer

Anselm Kiefer

Pour Paul Celan

A reminder to Europe at Grand Palais Éphémère

 16 December 2021 to 11 January 2022 

At the invitation of French President Emmanuel Macron, German artist Anselm Kiefer is showing his artworks on the poetry of Paul Celan at the Grand Palais Ephémère in Paris. The artist's exhibitions have always been spectacular, but this exhibition is perhaps the most ambitious work.

With Pour Paul Celan, Anselm Kiefer continues his work on European memory, in which France and Germany play a central role. In this exhibition, sculptures, installations and 19 large-format canvases interact with the elusive poetry of the great German-speaking poet Paul Celan. The work of Paul Celan has been a constant presence in Anselm Kiefer's painting since his youth, when he discovered the poem "Todesfuge".

In excerpts from his diary written during the preparation of the exhibition at the Grand Palais Éphémère, Anselm Kiefer writes:

"Paul Celan's language comes from so far away, from another world with which we have not yet been confronted, it comes to us like that of an alien. we find it hard to understand. we grasp a fragment here and there. we cling to it without ever being able to capture the whole of it. i have humbly tried, for sixty years. from now on, i will write this language down on canvas, an undertaking that is like a rite."

President Emmanuel Macron has developed a friendship with the artist, who has lived in Paris since 1992, since taking office. In 2011, he was awarded the "Ordre des arts et lettres" by Frédéric Mitterand. In 2015/2016, the Centre Pompidou dedicated a major retrospective to him, and since 2020 his artworks have been on display at the Panthéon, the temple to works by glorious Frenchmen. Chris Dercon, the president of the RMN-Grand Palais chose Anselm Kiefer's works for the exhibition at a time when France is preparing to take over the presidency of the Council of the European Union.

Anselm Kiefer was born in Donaueschingen in Baden-Württemberg in March 1945, 2 months before the end of the war. Throughout his artistic life, he confronted the Nazi past of the Germans.

The connection to the work of Paul Celan has existed since the 1980s. The works of the poet and the artist have in common that they are touched by the dark sides of humanity. Paul Celan was a famous Jewish-Romanian poet of the second half of the 20th century. He was sent to a forced camp and lost his parents in the Shoah. The poetry Paul Celan felt, he wrote in German, the language of his tormentors. Paul Celan died on 20 April 1970 when he fell from a bridge into the Seine - presumably the past never let go of him.

19 gigantic paintings, all with Paul Celan's poetry, show devastated, snow-covered fields, explosions and a submarine floating in the sea. There is a round concrete bunker with rods anchored in it that could be flowers. There is also a full-size aeroplane from the 1940s, its wings weighted down by books. The paintings are interrupted by warm orange jumpers made of lacquer or gold leaf and holes that bring a little light into the apocalyptic scenes.

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Pour Paul Celan is organised by the Réunion des Musées Nationaux - Grand Palais in collaboration with the Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac in association with the French Presidency of the Council of the European Union 2022.

The Grand Palais Éphémère, a 10,000 square metre space designed by architect Jean-Michel Wilmotte, is the habitat for this installation. The École Militaire and the modern UNESCO buildings to the south will reflect the leitmotifs that run through the artist's work: the political history of Europe and its conflicts.

The project is accompanied by a book containing texts by philosopher Emanuele Coccia, artist Edmund de Waal, filmmaker Alexander Kluge and curator Ulrich Wilmes, as well as excerpts from Anselm Kiefer's diary.

Rmn - Grand Palais

Réunion des musées nationaux - Grand Palais 

254-256 rue de Bercy

75 577 Paris

www.grandpalais.fr