Anna and Bernhard Blume
Constructive Chaos
In Anna and Bernhard Blume’s world, order prevails. She takes her place, complete with decorative dress, in the kitchen, surrounded by plates, cups, and jugs. He, wearing a fine plaid jacket, concerns himself with technical devices. Yet, this selfsame world is also one of complete chaos. The compulsion to play roles causes towers of cups to sway, people to fly around, their faces distorted, and furniture constructions to collapse.
The Blumes focus on the metaphors attached to objects, for the latter are laden down with convention. They explore everyday objects as a symptom of the times – of the age when they were youngsters and of the age in which we all now live. In the tradition of performance art, the home of both artists, this process of questioning also entails relishing a situation in which all is set in flux or even “smashed up”, as Bernhard Blume puts it. This is not to suggest their work is destructive: "Our wish was and is always just to relativize different levels of order.” And the Blumes present this by means in their very own ironic and sarcastic way.
Anna and Bernhard Blume always devise their picture sequences jointly and always do all the work themselves: from designing the sets and costumes, via taking the shots of each other, through to developing the negatives and producing enlargements. During each of these steps, the artwork is continuously refined, polished, and painted. “We paint with our camera,“ Anna Blume avers, "and this painterly work continues in the lab, too.“ However, their black-and-white photo series do not involve digital manipulation or montage. Instead, they really do involve a flying, crashing, and swirling world. In order to take what are in fact quite dangerous photographs, the artists make use of securing ropes, safety nets, mattresses, etc.
Only 10 or 15 years ago, Anna and Bernhard Blume staged with great artistry settings emphasizing the independent life objects appear to assume. In the computer age, this magic behavior by objects, which suddenly seem alive, has become part of the customary idiom of an entire genre of mystery films, sci-fi stories, and the like. “In a certain sense, we were possibly pioneers of a world of perception which today is the domain of an entire film industry,” the artists say, with a twinkle in their eyes.
Biographical information
Anna Blume
1936
born in Bork/Westfalen, Germany
1960-65
studies at the Staatliche Kunstakademie Düsseldorf, Germany
since 1987
has been a guest lecturer at several art colleges
2020
dies in Cologne, Germany
Bernhard Blume
1937
born in Dortmund, Germany
1960-65
studies at the Staatliche Kunstakademie Düsseldorf, Germany
1967-70
studies philosophy at the University of Cologne, Germany
since 1987
works as a Professor for Art and Visual Communication at the Hochschule für bildende Künste Hamburg, Germany
2011
dies in Cologne, Germany
together
1990
receive the Konrad-von-Soest-Prize
1996
receive the Edwin-Scharff-Prize
2000
receive the Berlin Art Price