Der Fernseher als Galerie

In the organizer's words:

In April 1969, works of art from the international avant-garde appeared in an unexpected place: on the television screens of German living rooms. The filmmaker Gerry Schum and the art historian Ursula Wevers had transformed television into an exhibition space for art. With the Fernsehgalerie Gerry Schum and the later videogalerie schum, they were among the first to attempt to establish television and video as artistic media.

Theexhibition Der Fernseher als Galerie. The Gerry Schum and Ursula Wevers Archive tells the story of this now legendary project and is also linked to a significant acquisition: The ZKM is taking over the Gerry Schum and Ursula Wevers archive, thereby securing one of the most important archives of 20th century art for future generations. The acquisition was made possible by the support of the Kulturstiftung der Länder, the City of Karlsruhe and the State of Baden-Württemberg.

Towards the end of the 1960s, the work of art as an object was increasingly called into question. However, processes, actions and site-specific works defied the usual forms of collecting and exhibiting. Gerry Schum and Ursula Wevers' response to this situation was as simple as it was radical: this art needed a new medium.

On April 15, 1969, the Gerry Schum television gallery went on air for the first time: ARD broadcast LAND ART, the first television exhibition. A second television exhibition followed on November 30, 1970 with IDENTIFICATIONS on Südwestfunk. All the films were conceived for television and practically only existed at the moment of broadcast. The productions, which are now part of the international canon of video art, land art and conceptual art, were created in collaboration with 30 artists, including Joseph Beuys, Daniel Buren, Jan Dibbets, Richard Long, Mario Merz, Richard Serra and Lawrence Weiner. In addition, there were the television interventions by Keith Arnatt and Jan Dibbets, who intervened unannounced in the ongoing program.

"One of our ideas is the communication of art instead of the possession of art objects," explained Gerry Schum. In fact, the project aimed not only at a new medium, but also at a different public for art and a new economy. The television gallery was an alternative concept to the exclusivity of museums, galleries and the art market.

However, the structural limits of this critique of art as a commodity soon became apparent. When the television stations refused to continue the collaboration, the project had to adapt to the very structures of the art market that it had originally sought to escape. In 1971, Schum and Wevers founded the videogalerie schum in Düsseldorf, creating a new, pioneering model - the first gallery in Europe dedicated exclusively to the production and distribution of video editions.

The exhibition uses the extensive archive to tell a story of utopias, of success and failure - from Gerry Schum's first films from 1967 to his suicide in 1973. In doing so, it frees this story from being reduced to a single protagonist. From the very beginning, the project was characterized by collaboration: first with Bernhard Höke and Hannah Weitemeier, then above all with Ursula Wevers, who played a decisive role in the realization of the Gerry Schum television gallery and the later videogalerie schum from October 1968.

The exhibition is based on the archive that Ursula Wevers kept for over 50 years. On display are not only the well-known film and video works, but also original 16-mm films and video tapes, historical video technology as well as correspondence, production documents, photographs, printed matter and certificates. These materials provide an insight into the conceptual work behind the projects, institutional conflicts and the practical conditions of production.

The Fernsehgalerie and videogalerie schum are not only important as pioneering art projects. They also show with particular clarity a dynamic that also characterizes our present: New media not only change the form of art, but also its conditions - its production, its distribution and its ownership.

Artists / Contributors

Giovanni Anselmo, John Baldessari, Joseph Beuys, Alighiero Boetti, Marinus Boezem, Stanley Brouwn, Daniel Buren, Pier Paolo Calzolari, Gino De Dominicis, Walter de Maria, Jan Dibbets, Barry Flanagan, Hamish Fulton, Gilbert & George, Michael Heizer, Bernhard Höke, Gary Kuehn, Richard Long, Mario Merz, Dennis Oppenheim, Klaus Rinke, Ulrich Rückriem, Reiner Ruthenbeck, Gerry Schum, Richard Serra, Robert Smithson, Keith Sonnier, Ger van Elk, Franz Erhard Walther, Lawrence Weiner, Hannah Weitemeier, Ursula Wevers, Gilberto Zorio.