Art Insight #16: Susanne Gaensheimer

Director of MMK, Museum für Moderne Kunst Frankfurt am Main

Museum für Moderne Kunst (MMK) is highlighting their importance in the modern art world by building three branches in one city. This ambitious project has been realized as Susanne Gaensheimer was appointed as the chief director of the museum. By collecting a broad range of art works extending to works of 1960s and distributing them in the three displaying areas, the museum is attracting more audiences than ever. This also contributes to making Frankfurt an even more attractive place.

The main building of MMK is the center for the museum, the MMK2, in a building which a real estate dealer named Taunus Turm has lent free of charge, is a good example of a museum that is run by sponsorships and private mecenat. MMK3, which was renovated from an old building of 1927, is not as well known in Germany, however the building is open and being used to exhibit individual exhibitions. Moreover, the building is in an active use to exhibit group works of universities, foundations and many other organizations. We have met Susanne Gaensheimer who is having a very busy time as the chief director of MMK, as a curator and as an educator.

And that is what makes us special, the fantastic holdings we have in the collection and the continuous willingness of artists from all around the world to realize exhibitions with us. - Susanne Gaensheimer -

Q. In one interview that you had in 2008 just right after you became the director of MMK, you said that “My priority is to work with the collection.” Can I ask about the direction of the collection?

With more than 5000 artworks by artists of many nationalities, the MMK's collection is not just extensive; it is also of very high quality and it is diverse. From the beginning on the Museum focused on international art of every format and medium. The MMK was one of the first museums in Germany to collect photography in the early 1990’s. Film, video, installation, performance and conceptual art are in the collection. We always collected in very close cooperation with the artists, which is the reason for the high quality of the works in our collection. Virtually no other German museum offers such a high concentration of outstanding contemporary art, and internationally as well, the MMK is regarded as one of the leading museums of modern and contemporary art opening up more and more to a global perspective.

Q. I was impressed by the show of the German Pavilion at the Venice Biennale in 2013 where you introduced Ai Weiwei, Romuald Karmakar, Dayanita Singh and Santu Mofokeng. Those 4 artists were not German artists but in the German Pavilion. The biennale had Post-national achievements in several ways and you played a significant role. I would like to hear about your personal opinion on Post-nationalism and globalism.

I do believe that we have to renegotiate the self-understanding of our Western art-historical canon and that it is our duty to contextualize our past with what has been going on elsewhere, as well as to reflect ourselves today within the contemporary context of a global world. In both Frankfurt and Venice I tried and still try to realize contributions in this regard. Exhibitions like The Divine Comedy, Heaven, Hell, Purgatory revisited by Contemporary African Artists, which brought together more than 50 artist who have their roots in the African continent, as well as solo-exhibitions by Hélio Oiticia, Subodh Gupta, Dayanita Singh or Hassan Khan are examples of this move. Currently we are working on a large solo-show by Kader Attia as well as a presentation of photographs by Claudia Andujar. I believe that we at the MMK in Frankfurt are part of a larger development towards a more and maybe even true international perspective on art, a development which can be watched also at other leading European art institutions like the Tate in London or the Centre Pompidouin Paris and which at least in Europe surely has been initiated by Okwui Enwezor’s documenta 11 in Kassel.

Q. Your pavilion won the Golden Lion prize of the Venice Biennale in 2011.

Given that Christoph Schlingensief very unfortunately died during the preparation of the exhibition and our hope to be able to represent his work meaningfully, this outstanding recognition was definitely one of my most important experiences of the last couple of years. This recognition was so relieving because it was really not easy to present Christoph Schlingensief’s work after his death without himself being involved in the project and we were extremely happy to receive this outstanding appreciation of his extraordinary work by the international art scene.

Q. What exhibitions and programs do you have planned now? Can you provide any details about 2016 resolution for you and your team?

We start in March at MMK 2 with the exhibition “An Imagined Museum. Works from Centre Pompidou, Tate and MMK”. Inspired by Ray Bradbury’s science-fiction novel Fahrenheit 451 (1953), the exhibition transports its visitors into a dystopian scenario of the future in which artworks are banned from society. More than eighty masterpieces from three of Europe’s most renowned collections have been put into safekeeping and united in a temporary transnational museum.
At MMK 1 we will have a large solo show by Kader Attia starting in April. He will investigate the far-reaching consequences of colonialism and Western cultural hegemony for non-Western cultures against the background of our globalized present. In autumn we present Fiona Tan. She will transform the MMK architecture into an oppressive scenario that, occupied by a fictional figure, is reminiscent of commercial storage spaces as well as “free ports of culture”.

Q. What distinguishes the MMK from other museums? What’s in store for the future?

Our three venues MMK1, 2 and 3 make us both extremely flexible and dynamic and at the same time able to focus on and constantly reorganize the way we understand and present our collections and exhibition programs. And that is what makes us special, the fantastic holdings we have in the collection and the continuous willingness of artists from all around the world to realize exhibitions with us.

Q. As a director of MMK, what are your thoughts on the institutions supported by corporations like Hyundai Motor? Germany also has many cooperative corporations for art scenes such as BMW and Volkswagen. What do you think about the role of corporations for art and institutions and through the sponsorship what the corporations could get?

In Germany we are presently in a phase of transition – the circumstances surrounding cultural funding are undergoing radical changes. Public funding of art institutions is decreasing and we have to cooperate more and more with corporate sponsors. Our new museum branch, the MMK 2, would not have been possible without the support of Tishman Speyer and other corporate sponsors. Thanks to them we have succeeded in building a huge new exhibition space for the MMK. We have to learn to be more flexible and to think about new forms of museum work. And this is not only the case in Germany, but more and more also in other European countries.

Q. Congratulations on being appointed as the curator of the 13th Fellbach Triennial 2016. Can you give me a hint about the Triennial?

The title of the show will be “FOOD – Ecologies of the Everyday” and we will show sculptural and installation works by more than 40 artists from all over the world. Our intention is to investigate in what way contemporary art reflects food and its related processes like food production and food consumption as well as other ecological interrelations and circulations in the context of a global situation. Some historical positions like that of Gordon Matta-Clark and Felix Gonzalez-Torres will build a kind of framework within which we will present various rather young international artists from all continents.

Q. What are your thoughts on the Korean art scene? What do you think about Korean art? Also I wonder about your opinion on the Asian art scene.

I am very fascinated and have been watching how the art scene in Korea developed in the last decade. Seoul with its high variety of museums, exhibition institutions and galleries is one of the art hot spots in the world and of course the Gwangju Biennale has written art history. I do believe that Asia is one of the most fascinating sub systems in our contemporary scene and I am constantly hoping to be able to learn more about it. And we are very proud that the MMK owns One Candle, one of the very great works by one of the greatest artists of the 20th century, Nam June Paik.

Q. As a leading figure in the world of contemporary art, do you have any advice for aspiring young artists and curators?

Learn about our past to be able to live our future. Take responsibility for what art is and can be. ■ with ARTINPOST

View of MMK(Museum fur Moderne Kunst Frankfurt am Main)
View of MMK(Museum fur Moderne Kunst Frankfurt am Main)
Installation view of <William Forsythe, Nowhere and Everywhere at the Same Time, No.3, 2015> at MMK(Museum fur Moderne Kunst Frankfurt am Main)

Courtesy of the artist Photo: Dominik Mentzos
Installation view of <Kostas Murkudis, Verschiedene Modelle aus den Kollektionen Spring/Summer 2010?2013> at MMK(Museum fur Moderne Kunst Frankfurt am Main)

Photo: Axel Schneider
Außenansicht, MMK2 im TaunusTurm
View of MMK(Museum fur Moderne Kunst Frankfurt am Main)
MMK1(Museum fur Moderne Kunst Frankfurt am Main)

Foto: Axel Schneider
View of MMK(Museum fur Moderne Kunst Frankfurt am Main)

Profile

Susanne Gaensheimer is the director of Museum für Moderne Kunst. Including Westfälischer Kunstverein Münster, Lenbachhaus in München, Gaensheimer has been working in important positions related to the modern art. She gained international fame as she undertook the position as a curator in the German Pavilion at Venice biennale in 2011 and 2013 and was awarded. This led her to be appointed as a jury of the Turner Prize, the world authority art prize. Apart from the titles of exhibition manager and the museum director, she is also teaching art history at Goethe University, training younger students since 2013. She is rising in distinction in the world of modern art, as in 2014, she found MMK2, the branch of Museum für Moderne Kunst, and as she has been in charge of the 13th Triennale Fellbach as a chief project manager.

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