Künstler und Propheten. Eine geheime Geschichte der Moderne 1872–1972

It is "the" secret history of modernity

A secret history of modernism? Egon Schiele saw himself as a seer and prophetic artist, František Kupka suddenly painted spiritualised abstractions, Joseph Beuys called for a social revolution with the help of art, and Friedensreich Hundertwasser created the first of his famous spirals. These groundbreaking artistic developments would not have happened without the encounter with the life and work of the artist-naturists. The significance of the rise of these artist-naturists, who also saw themselves as religious dissenters and social revolutionaries, is a largely untold story for modern art. Their names - Karl Wilhelm Diefenbach (1851-1913), for example, or Gusto Gräser (1879-1958), Gustav Nagel (1874-1952), Friederich Muck-Lamberty (1891-1984), Ludwig Christian Haeusser (1881-1927) - are almost forgotten in the art world today, although they were well known and highly esteemed in avant-garde circles. Through the exhibition and book - with around 300 works by František Kupka (1871-1957), Egon Schiele (1890-1918), Johannes Baader (1876-1955), Max Schulze-Sölde (1887-1967), Heinrich Vogeler (1872-1942), Friedrich Schröder-Sonnenstern (1892-1982), Friedensreich Hundertwasser (1928-2000), Joseph Beuys (1921-1986) and Jörg Immendorf (1945-2007) as well as diverse documentary material - causalities are uncovered, unexpected connecting lines are drawn through modernism and the so-called saviours and the artistic avant-garde are integrated into a far-reaching art and cultural-historical context.

Exhibition:
Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt, 6/3 - 21/6/2015