I will be teaching as a guest professor this winter semester at the Staedelschule art school in Frankfurt.
In the seminar, we will focus on Appropriation Art, a practice that raises fundamental questions about originality, authorship and the connection between art and culture through the deliberate appropriation and reinterpretation of existing works. It originated in the 1960s and 1970s, when artists such as Andy Warhol, Sherrie Levine and Richard Prince questioned the boundaries between copy and original and challenged conventional notions of art. We will read and discuss texts to explore the historical development of Appropriation Art, from its early manifestations in Pop Art and Conceptual Art to its use as a critical tool to address social and cultural issues. One focus will be on the question of the legitimacy of appropriation: What ethical and legal implications are associated with the appropriation of other people’s works? What are the limits of appropriation art as a means of cultural criticism and reflection? We will examine how appropriation is evaluated today and what role it plays in current discourses on cultural appropriation, power relations, identity politics and cultural sovereignty. Through theoretical analyses and critical discussions, we will create a space in which both historical knowledge can be deepened and one’s own artistic practices can be refined.