From the documenta archiv #12

Thursday, February 6, 2020, 6:30 pm

Venue: Fridericianum, Friedrichsplatz 18, 34117 Kassel

Admission free

Address of Welcome: Martin Groh, acting director of the documenta archiv

Polluted water or dirty air, nuclear danger or dying forests, factory farming, climate change or the Anthropocene: at almost all documenta exhibitions since the 1960s, artists and curators alike have addressed central themes of the ecological movement. Their contributions were often subject to fierce controversies or set them in motion through actions or deliberate provocations. Thinking of works such as "7000 Eichen. Stadtverwaldung statt Stadtverwaltung [7000 oaks. city forestation instead of city administration]" by Joseph Beuys (d7, 1982) or the staged pigsty in the baroque garden "Ein Haus für Schweine und Menschen [A house for pigs and people]" by Carsten Höller and Rosemarie Trockel (d10, 1997). Yet these discussions did not begin with the opening of the respective documenta.

The documenta archiv possesses extensive archive material, with which Anne-Kathrin Winkler-Hanns uses to trace the ecological discourses held between artists, curators, technical staff, administration, and urban society. At the same time, she addresses the shifting usages of "natural materials" in artistic and curatorial processes.

Anne-Kathrin Winkler-Hanns focuses with her scientific and professional work on themes of the environment and sustainability. In her lecture, she presents the results of her dissertation completed at the Institute of cultural science at the Humboldt-University in Berlin with the title "Kulturen des Zeigens. Die Bilder des Ökologischen und die documenta [Cultures of showing. The images of the ecology and documenta]". For more than ten years now working as a project manager in the car manufacturing city of Wolfsburg, she has been developing and implementing exhibition and offerings of mediation for sustainable action and accompanies transformation processes within companies.