Die Zeitungsleser und der Philosoph

The Newspaper Readers and the Philosopher

CR 883. Year 2004

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Questions from Jochen Gerz

Is love and love the same thing?

Has it become easier to be a human being today?

Should we talk about everything?
(Do you want to know it all?)

‘Art is part of the theory of heat’ Jochen Gerz once said, hinting at that main problem of communication: Touching another, one who is impacted by artistic expression in the way of an intense question. For the one striving for such an exchange of energy applies what Elias Canetti noted in ‘The Human Province’: ‘this urgent feeling, that I have to know everything about everyone, when and how they lived, as if my own salvation depended on everyone, their peculiarity, their uniqueness, their progress and furthermore, on what they should be together.’

Georges Schlocker 1974. Translated by e_CR editors

"Kunst ist ein Teil der Wärmelehre" sagte einmal Jochen Gerz. Damit weist er hin auf jenes Hauptproblem, das Kommunikation heißt. Berührung eines Gegenübers, auf welches Kunstäußerung als intensive Frage einwirkt. Wer solchen Wärmeaustausch anstrebt, für den gilt, was Elias Canetti in der "Provinz des Menschen" von sich notiert, nämlich "dieses dringliche Gefühl, daß ich alles über alle Menschen wissen muß, wann und wie immer sie gelebt haben, als hinge meine Seligkeit von jedem ab, seiner Eigenart, seiner Einmaligkeit, seinem Verlauf und dann noch von dem, was sie zusammen sein sollten."

Georges Schlocker 1974

It starts to be interesting when the social turns into poetry. For, while the sociological provides structure, the social provides relationships. It starts to be interesting when the tools of reasoning and acting are being renewed, when art puts on the dress of reality.

Adrienne Göhler 2004. Translated by e_CR editors

Spannend wird es da, wo das Soziale Poesie wird. Denn während das Soziologische strukturiert, schafft das Soziale Beziehungen. Spannend wird es da, wo die Werkzeuge des Denkens und Handelns erneuert werden, spannend da, wo die Kunst das Kleid der Wirklichkeit überstreift.

Adrienne Göhler 2004

Public authorship

Passau, Deutschland

Newspaper ads

The public art work Die Zeitungsleser und der Philosoph (The Newspaper Readers and the Philosopher) was Jochen Gerz’ response to an invitation from the Bavarian Passau Press Group to the annual solo art exhibition at the sponsor’s media centre.

Gerz used the medium Passauer Neue Presse to establish contact with its readers. Each week, the newspaper published one of six questions on a full-page along with a comment on each question by the philosopher Friedrich Kittler. Three-quarters of the page were left blank for use by readers to answer the artist’s question.

More than 1,000 responses were submitted. Eighty seats at a philosophy discussion with Friedrich Kittler and a group banquet were awarded in a draw. The topic of the discussion was the most frequently answered question: Is love and love the same thing?

Participants

Friedrich Kittler and more than 1,000 readers of the Passauer Neue Presse

Partners

Passauer Neue Presse, Gabriele Lindinger, Edith Rabenstein, Karlheinz Schmid

Realisation

Passau 2004

Bibliography

I: Passau 2004

II: Ed. 31, 2004. Kohl 2004. Raab 2004. Rabenstein 1, 2004. Rabenstein 4, 2004. Rabenstein 6, 2004. Rabenstein 7, 2004. Restorff 2004. Schmid 2004. Straßer 2004. Teschner 2004.

III: Ed. 2, 2004

Access general bibliography

My name is Jochen Gerz