Project for OFF-Biennale Budapest 2015

Regarding the structure of the Off Biennial in Budapest, which emerged as both a reflection and a critique by a group of individuals on the current social and political climate in Hungary, a solo exhibition of Frank Uwe Laysiepen – Ulay is conceptualized around his action There is a Criminal Touch to Art, which took place in 1976 in Berlin.

Beyond the fact that this action is one of the crucial points of Ulay’s artistic engagement, it also directly comments on and reexamines the social and political climate of Germany in the 1970s. The core of the action, performed by Ulay in 1976, was the “art theft” of Carl Spitzweg’s painting The Poor Poet from the Neue Nationalgalerie. The theft of this “symbol of the German soul” and its subsequent placement in a Turkish family’s living room in Kreuzberg (one of Berlin’s districts) was not merely a symbolic demonstration against Germany’s identity icons but also a direct commentary on the artist’s concerns regarding the difficult situation of immigrants and their families in Germany during the 1970s.

The exhibition conceived for the Off Biennial will be the first in-depth presentation of this action, aiming to reveal its different layers. At the same time, the exhibition also strives to highlight the ethical engagement that defines Ulay’s artistic practice in general.