Joseph Beuys

On 9 January 1974, Joseph Beuys, together with Klaus Staeck and Gerhard Steidl, travelled for the first time to America. This trip was by no means a mere visit, but a carefully planned performance that took place in airplanes, taxis, hotels, universities, and galleries, and was comprehensively documented in photographs and video. The tour began with a packed lecture at...

A sumptuous room in the Museum of Fine Arts in Ghent in 1980: on its wall hang Flemish Old Master paintings, gleaming in their gilt frames; yet in the middle of the room stand industrial metal shelves, sparsely stocked with packets of everyday perishable products, salt, flour, olives, and peas. Each packet is signed by Joseph Beuys and labelled with...

On 27 April 1973, Joseph Beuys founded the Free International University for Creativity and Interdisciplinary Research, a staunchly anti-establishment institution designed to help individuals realise their creative potential (regardless of their social, economic and educational backgrounds). This creativity-through-art was intended to foster social progress. As part of the university, Beuys staged an ambitious series of 13 workshops over 100 days...

In early 1974, Joseph Beuys, Klaus Staeck, and Gerhard Steidl sat in a Boeing 747 from New York to Düsseldorf, returning home after Beuys' American tour. The trip had been a controversial success, and its every stage was carefully documented by Staeck and Steidl in videos, photographs, and audio—their trusty Sony TC-50 cassette recorder was always at Beuys' side during...

This book examines the crucial period between Joseph Beuys' return to his hometown of Kleve after World War II at the age of 24 and his appointment as a professor at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf in 1961. During this "incubation" phase, key themes relevant to his future work emerged, which now structure this book: biography as material for artistic forming; Beuys...