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The Art and Politics and Asger Jorn ashgate.com © copyrighted material ashgate.com the art and politics of asger jorn A leading fgure of the postwar avant-garde, Danish artist Asger Jorn has long been recognized for his founding contributions to the Cobra and Situationist International movements—yet art historical scholarship on Jorn has been sparse, particularly in English. This study corrects that imbalance, ofering a synthetic account of the essential phases of this prolifc artist’s career. It addresses his works in various media alongside his extensive writings and his collaborations with various artists’ groups from the 1940s through the mid-1960s. Situating Jorn’s work in an international, post-Second World War context, Karen Kurczynski reframes our understanding of the 1950s, away from the Abstract-Expressionist focus on individual expression, toward a more open- ended conception of art as a public engagement with contemporary culture and politics. Kurczynski engages with issues of interest to twenty-frst-century artists and scholars, highlighting Jorn’s proposition that the sensory address of art and its complex relationship to popular media can have a direct social impact. Perhaps most signifcantly, this study foregrounds Jorn’s assertion that creativity is crucial to subjectivity itself in our increasingly mediated “Society of the Spectacle.” Karen Kurczynski is Assistant Professor of Modern and Contemporary Art History at the University of Massachusets, Amherst, USA. ashgate.com © copyrighted material ashgate.com 9781409431978_Kurczynski.indb 1 5/8/2014 10:10:46 AM ashgate.com © copyrighted material ashgate.com For my mother, Elizabeth Kurczynski ashgate.com © copyrighted material ashgate.com 9781409431978_Kurczynski.indb 2 5/8/2014 10:10:46 AM ashgate.com © copyrighted material ashgate.com The Art and Politics of Asger Jorn The Avant-Garde Won’t Give Up Karen Kurczynski ashgate.com © copyrighted material ashgate.com 9781409431978_Kurczynski.indb 3 5/8/2014 10:10:46 AM ashgate.com © copyrighted material ashgate.com © Karen Kurczynski 2014 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmited in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without the prior permission of the publisher. Karen Kurczynski has asserted her right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identifed as the author of this work. Published by Ashgate Publishing Limited Ashgate Publishing Company Wey Court East 110 Cherry Street Union Road Suite 3-1 Farnham Burlington, VT 05401-3818 Surrey, GU9 7PT USA England htp://www.ashgate.com British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. The Library of Congress has cataloged the printed edition as follows: Kurczynski, Karen. The art and politics of Asger Jorn : the avant-garde won’t give up / by Karen Kurczynski. pages cm Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-1-4094-3197-8 (hardcover : alk. paper) 1. Jorn, Asger, 1914–1973—Criticism and interpretation. I. Title. N7023.J67K87 2014 709.2—dc23 2014002727 ISBN 9781409431978 (hbk) Printed and bound in Great Britain by Henry Ling Limited, at the Dorset Press, Dorchester, DT1 1HD ashgate.com © copyrighted material ashgate.com 9781409431978_Kurczynski.indb 4 5/8/2014 10:10:47 AM ashgate.com © copyrighted material ashgate.com Contents List of illustrations vii Acknowledgements xi List of abbreviations xiii Introductory refections: Jorn’s kitsch-avant-garde 1 1 Spontaneous myths 27 Spontaneous abstraction 29 Post-expressionism 35 Painting as mythmaking 41 Nordic myth? 49 Resisting a “new myth” 55 2 Communal expressions 65 The kindergarten murals 70 A new beginning 73 The Bregnerød murals 77 Common imagery 84 The Silent Myth murals 88 3 Material visions 105 Form defes Functionalism 109 The turn to ceramics 113 The International Ceramics Congresses 119 The Århus ceramic mural 125 Tapestry: Modernity and tradition 133 4 Jubilant critiques 147 Fin de Copenhague 149 Détournement and kitsch 154 Mémoires 161 Memory as fction 167 ashgate.com © copyrighted material ashgate.com 9781409431978_Kurczynski.indb 5 5/8/2014 10:10:47 AM vi the art and politics of asger jorn ashgate.com © copyrighted material ashgate.com Disorienting structures 170 Détourned paintings 173 Exiting the SI 181 5 Authentic ironies 191 Refusing transcendence 192 The immediacy of painting 196 Ironic expression 201 Nordic Expressionism? 205 A Soul for Sale 208 The “Luxury Paintings” 212 6 Conclusion: New legacies 223 Bibliography 229 Index 249 ashgate.com © copyrighted material ashgate.com 9781409431978_Kurczynski.indb 6 5/8/2014 10:10:47 AM ashgate.com © copyrighted material ashgate.com List of illustrations All images by Asger Jorn are © Donation Jorn, Silkeborg, Denmark. Color plates 1 Asger Jorn, Titania II, 1940–1941. and glass. Entire mural 27 × 3 meters. Oil on canvas. 120 × 115 cm. Louisiana Statsgymnasium, Århus, Denmark. Museum, Humlebæk, Denmark Photo: Lars Bay 2 Asger Jorn, Trolden og fuglene (The 8 Asger Jorn and Pierre Wemaëre, Troll and the Birds), 1944. Oil on masonite. Le long voyage (The Long Voyage), tapestry, 122 × 260 cm. Museum Jorn, Silkeborg. 1961. 185 × 1380 cm. Museum Jorn, Photo: Lars Bay Silkeborg. Photo: Lars Bay 3 Asger Jorn, Sketch for wall mural at 9 Asger Jorn, Untitled, 1959. Detail Bregnerød, 1949. Oil on canvas, 38 × of ceramic mural: glazed ceramic and 30 cm. Atk. 619. Museum Jorn, Silkeborg. glass. Statsgymnasium, Århus, Denmark. Photo: Lars Bay Photo by the author 4 Asger Jorn, Elaboration d’une mythe 10 Asger Jorn and Pierre Wemaëre, muet (On the Silent Myth), Opus 2, 1952. Le long voyage (The Long Voyage), tapestry, Oil on masonite. 135 × 300 cm. Silkeborg detail of Color Plate 8, 1961. Entire Bibliotek. Photo: Lars Bay tapestry 185 × 1380 cm. Museum Jorn, Silkeborg. Photo: Lars Bay 5 Asger Jorn, Elaboration d’une mythe muet (On the Silent Myth), Opus 7, 11 Asger Jorn and Guy Debord, 1953. Oil on masonite. 134.5 × 300 cm. Two-page spread from Fin de Copenhague. Silkeborg Bibliotek. Photo: Lars Bay Copenhagen: Permild and Rosengreen, 6 Asger Jorn, Untitled, 1959. Central 1957. 25.5 × 17.5 cm. Museum Jorn, section of ceramic mural: glazed ceramic Silkeborg. Photo: Lars Bay and glass. Entire mural 27 × 3 meters. 12 Guy Debord and Asger Jorn, Statsgymnasium, Århus, Denmark. Two-page spread from Mémoires, 1959. Photo by the author 27.5 × 21.5 cm. Copenhagen: Permild 7 Asger Jorn, Untitled, 1959. Detail and Rosengreen, n.p. Museum Jorn, of ceramic mural: glazed ceramic Silkeborg. Photo: Lars Bay ashgate.com © copyrighted material ashgate.com 9781409431978_Kurczynski.indb 7 5/8/2014 10:10:47 AM viii the art and politics of asger jorn ashgate.com © copyrighted material ashgate.com 13 Asger Jorn, Il Delinquente (The Pigen i ilden (The Girl in the Fire), artist’s Delinquent), 1956. Oil on canvas. 114 × book, pp. 2–3. Linocuts and typeset on 145 cm. Galerie Van de Loo, Munich featherweight paper. 21 × 24 cm. Copenhagen: Fischer, 1939. Museum 14 Asger Jorn, They Never Come Back, Jorn, Silkeborg. Photo: Lars Bay 1958. Oil on canvas, 146 × 114 cm. Städtische Galerie im Lenbachhaus und I.7 Asger Jorn, Bakken (The Hill), 1939. Kunstbau, Munich Oil and sand on canvas, 33.2 × 80 cm. Museum Jorn, Silkeborg. Photo: Lars Bay 15 Asger Jorn, La double face (The Double Face), 1960. Oil on canvas. 116 × 1.1 Asger Jorn, Det blå billede (The Blue 89 cm. Louisiana Museum, Humlebæk, Picture), 1940. Oil on canvas. 80 × 100 cm. Denmark Museum Jorn, Silkeborg. Photo: Lars Bay 16 Asger Jorn, Ausverkauf einer Seele 1.2 Asger Jorn, Saxnäs, 1946. Oil (A Soul for Sale), 1958–1959. Oil on on masonite. 153.5 × 123 cm. Statens canvas. 200 × 250 cm. Solomon R. Museum for Kunst, Copenhagen Guggenheim Museum, New York 1.3 Asger Jorn, Untitled drawing, 1946. Ink on paper, ca. 31 × 22 cm. Location unknown. Image courtesy of the Black and white illustrations Museum Jorn I.1 Asger Jorn, L’avant-garde se rend 1.4 Elna Fonnesbech-Sandberg (left) pas (The Avant-Garde Won’t Give Up), and Wifredo Lam (right), Interpretations 1962. Oil on found painting on canvas, of Asger Jorn’s drawing, 1946. Ink on 73 × 60 cm. Collection Pierre and Micky transparent paper, each page ca. 31 × Alechinsky 22 cm. Troels Jorn collection. © 2013 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / COPY- I.2 Asger Jorn, “Intime banaliteter DAN, Copenhagen / ADAGP, Paris (Intimate Banalities),” Helhesten 1, no. 2 (May 1941), pp. 34–5. Museum Jorn, 1.5 Asger Jorn, Røde syner (Red Silkeborg Visions),1944. Oil on canvas. 70 × 84 cm. Statens Museum for Kunst, Copenhagen I.3 Asger Jorn, Morgenstund har guld i mund til vort arbejd ile, 1933–1934. 1.6 Asger Jorn, Mask, 1945. Oil on Linocut. 7.4 × 8 cm. Museum Jorn, plywood, 81 × 64 cm. KUNSTEN Silkeborg. Photo: Lars Bay Museum of Modern Art, Aalborg I.4 Anonymous photograph of Asger 1.7 Egill Jacobsen, Untitled, 1944. Oil Jorn and Kirsten Lyngborg on a BSA on canvas. 94 × 75 cm. Museum Jorn, motorcycle, ca. 1935. Private collection. Silkeborg. Egill og Evelyn Jacobsens Courtesy of Museum Jorn, Silkeborg fond, nr. 47. © 2013 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / COPY-DAN, I.5 Asger Jorn, Illustration for Jens Copenhagen August Schade, Kommodetyven (The Dresser Thief), 1937. Print after original 2.1 Asger Jorn, Drawing for mosaic collage. 28.8 × 20 cm. Museum Jorn, decorations in Raschs Vinhandel (Rasch’s Silkeborg Wine Shop), 1942. Architectural plan by Marinus Andersen with watercolors by I.6 Genia Kat Rajchmann, author, and Jorn. Two lower watercolors measure Asger Oluf Jørgensen (Asger Jorn), artist, 10.2 × 8.4 cm, upper image 9.9 × 6.1 cm. ashgate.com © copyrighted material ashgate.com 9781409431978_Kurczynski.indb 8 5/8/2014 10:10:47 AM list of illustrations ix ashgate.com © copyrighted material ashgate.com Statens Museum for Kunst, Copenhagen, 3.4 Lucio Fontana, Bataglia, 1948, Kobberstiksamlingen detail.
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