“What you are speaks so loud, I can’t hear what you say / Don’t tell me words don’t matter”, 2008 by Jane Jin Kaisen.
“Everything Else Has Failed! Don’t You Think It’s Time for Love?”, 2007 by Sharon Hayes. Performance for 25 Years Later: Welcome to Art in General, United Bank of Switzerland, New York, NY, September 17-21, 2007. Sharon Hayes spoke a different text of an anonymous love letter in front of the UBS tower at 12:30pm for five consecutive weekdays.
“The record archive”, in process by Dani Gal. “The record archive” is an ongoing project of collecting vinyl records that sound document historical events of the twentieth century.
“Ein sichtbares Zeichen (Eine Rede ist eine Rede ist eine Rede)”, 2009 by Ulrike Kuschel.
»Figure of Speech (Formation of a Crystal)«, 2009, computer generated diagram, dimensions variable, by Falke Pisano.
»Nogales« pairs a single 35mm slide-image of the walled town of Nogales, divided along the US/Mexican border, with an audio recording of Ronald Reagan’s famous speech at the Berlin Wall, “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!”, 2008 by Maryam Jafri.
»I’m sorry but I don’t want to be an Emperor—that’s not my business—I don’t want to rule or conquer anyone. I should like to help everyone if possible, Jew, gentile, black man, white. We all want to help one another, human beings are like that. We all want to live by each other’s happiness, not by each other’s misery. We don’t want to hate and despise one another. In this world there is room for everyone and the earth is rich and can provide for everyone. The way of life can be free and beautiful. But we have lost the way. Greed has poisoned men’s souls—has barricaded the world with hate; has goose-stepped us into misery and bloodshed. We have developed speed but we have shut ourselves in: machinery that gives abundance has left us in want. Our knowledge has made us cynical, our cleverness hard and unkind. We think too much and feel too little: More than machinery we need humanity; More than cleverness we need kindness and gentleness. Without these qualities, life will be violent and all will be lost. The aeroplane and the radio have brought us closer together. The very nature of these inventions cries out for the goodness in men, cries out for universal brotherhood for the unity of us all. Even now my voice is reaching millions throughout the world, millions of despairing men, women and little children, victims of a system that makes men torture and imprison innocent people. To those who can hear me I say “Do not despair.” The misery that is now upon us is but the passing of greed, the bitterness of men who fear the way of human progress: the hate of men will pass and dictators die and the power they took from the people will return to the people, and so long as men die [now] liberty will never perish.… Soldiers—don’t give yourselves to brutes, men who despise you and enslave you—who regiment your lives, tell you what to do, what to think and what to feel, who drill you, diet you, treat you as cattle, as cannon fodder. Don’t give yourselves to these unnatural men, machine men, with machine minds and machine hearts. You are not machines. You are not cattle. You are men. You have the love of humanity in your hearts. You don’t hate—only the unloved hate. Only the unloved and the unnatural. Soldiers—don’t fight for slavery, fight for liberty. In the seventeenth chapter of Saint Luke it is written “the kingdom of God is within man”—not one man, nor a group of men—but in all men—in you, the people. You the people have the power, the power to create machines, the power to create happiness. You the people have the power to make life free and beautiful, to make this life a wonderful adventure. Then in the name of democracy let’s use that power—let us all unite. Let us fight for a new world, a decent world that will give men a chance to work, that will give you the future and old age and security. By the promise of these things, brutes have risen to power, but they lie. They do not fulfill their promise, they never will. Dictators free themselves but they enslave the people. Now let us fight to fulfill that promise. Let us fight to free the world, to do away with national barriers, do away with greed, with hate and intolerance. Let us fight for a world of reason, a world where science and progress will lead to all men’s happiness. Soldiers—in the name of democracy, let us all unite! Look up! Look up! The clouds are lifting—the sun is breaking through. We are coming out of the darkness into the light. We are coming into a new world. A kind new world where men will rise above their hate and brutality. The soul of man has been given wings—and at last he is beginning to fly. He is flying into the rainbow—into the light of hope—into the future, that glorious future that belongs to you, to me and to all of us. Look up. Look up.«, 2005-2006. Charlie Chaplin’s speech from “The Great Dictator”, transposed into sign language, by Jordan Wolfson.
The opening of Andrea Fraser’s retrospective on 9. 11. 2003 at the Kunstverein in Hamburg. The video shows Fraser stripping while quoting from speeches given by critics, collectors, curators, politicians, and artists at openings, awards ceremonies, and other art events. She recites famous artists ranging from Mel Brooks and Thomas Hirschhorn to Shirin Neshat, Ross Bleckner, Francesco Clemente, Vanessa Beecroft, Damien Hirst, Chris Ofili, Tracey Emin, and Kara Walker.
“The Address” by Bani Abidi. In the tradition of trompe loiel paintings used as backdrops in Portrait studios, Bani Abidi commissioned a background painting resembling the set used for televised Presidential speeches. The image of this emtpty set was then displayed on TV sets in various public spaces in Lahore.
“Speaker’s Corner” – Various rhetorical proffessionals reading the artist’s script for a speech at the opening of the Busan Biennale. By Yang Haegue.
“Ladies and Gentlemen, my name is Yang Haegue, and I would like to welcome you warmly to our Busan Biennale. Sometimes we have an impression that an art exhibition might become a presentation of ability, overflowing with mannerism. Sometimes I ask to myself whether nowadays art is nothing but a rich menu of visual experiences like a sports festival advocating the slogan „higher, faster, and farther“, or whether the artist is no more than a modernist-progressive who does his best to present only something good in the name of ‘artistic creation’. So, here in front of you, I would like to share my opinions and feelings about my creative activities and life that I can express as a young artist. The reason why I insist on doing this in this place is that the form of the exhibition seems to have been unable to represent life and everydayness veraciously and actively, though they are inseparable from the artist’s creation and always function as an mirror to reflect the life of his own as well. Be them positive or negative, be them beautiful or heartbreaking, the emotions and impressions that I have got in my everyday life have been the fundamental source of my work and provided motifs and contents to it. The indigent, necessitous life brings forth a content related to destitute and poverty, and the days with strong experiences and impressions about the people and events around me produce more appealing works. Of course, like those of other ordinary people, my personal daily lives are mainly composed of simple observations and experiences, far from a succession of great marvelous ones. Everything, however, that I receive from people as well as my surroundings constitutes the basis of my art. Here, one might ask where the exclusive realm peculiar to art is, and where the true creativity of the artist is located. I think that the answer depends on how we define what the finished work is. Unfortunately, the practical problems and worries many artists share with one another everyday are left behind the curtains by the cause of ‘artistic creation’. Similarly, big or small ideas emerging from seemingly unartistic reflections and anguishes are just looked upon as mere informal episodes. These stories and scenes ‘behind the curtains’ have held my interest and affection. And here, I cannot help asking a question in return whether it is a too narrow definition of art if it assimilates all of them only from the plastic point of view. I feel the necessity of artistic attempts and experiments to enlarge the realm of art and to generate new experiences and reflections in everyday life. (….) Today, I could have made a lengthy speech again under the pretext of ‘art’, taking a great deal of your time. One of you might wonder where, then, my work is at all. I am afraid that I cannot but return disappointment mingled with a slight sense of betrayal or dubiety to you, rather than show some original imaginations and ideas resulting form a certain gift, or a novel spectacle. But it is the privilege in the name of art that gave me today’s opportunity. This Speaker’s Corner owed its existence to it. So, I would like to ascribe your unsatisfied expectations and my emotions of gratitude toward who I do not know only exclusively to art. Thank you for listening to me today.”