CHRISTIAN JANKOWSKI - GERMAN ARTIST - SIGNED & INSCRIBED "STRIP THE AUCTIONEER"
$ 66.0
Description
CHRISTIAN JANKOWSKI - STRIP THE AUCTIONEER at CHRISTIE’S. SIGNED and INSCRIBED by JANKOWSKI on the first page: "For Marcher / Christian Jankowski / 4.3.10". Softcovers, 8.5x10.5 inches, 48 unnumbered pages PLUS a bound-in 48 page booklet, with 36 pages in English and German that describe the auction, and 12 pages of reactions by the winning bidders of the various items. VERY GOOD condition, some light creases to the covers from handling, overall just lightly used and still tight, bright, clean and unmarked. A solid, very nice copy. Shows the actual AUCTION EVENT that took place at CHRISTIE’S, Amsterdam, where the LONGTIME AUCTIONEER ARNO VERKADE stripped and auctioned off much of his clothing, piece by piece, with the last piece being his personal Auctioneer’s Hammer. (If you are wondering, yes, he left his pants on.) The auction was incorporated into a PERFORMANCE PIECE / EXHIBITION put together by the CONTEMPORARY GERMAN ARTIST CHRISTIAN JANKOWSKI. The Christie’s “STRIP THE AUCTIONEER” was broadcast live into the Jankowski Exhibition on its opening day, as part of the exhibition. It was then shown on video repeatedly during the life of the exhibition. Published by Walther König, Köln, Germany, 2011. Looks like a Christie’s Auction Catalogue, but is actually a photographic revisiting of the auction, with photos by a Christie’s photographer. It was published after the auction took place, showing, through photographs, how it took place, how the auctioneer stripped, the items sold, and the prices they obtained. There is also a bound-in booklet that shows the winning bidders and gives their reactions to the items they won, the high prices they paid, and to the event as a whole. The pieces of clothing that the auctioneer removed and then auctioned included his shoes, socks, shirt, jacket, etc. Each item (i.e. one left shoe) went for approximately two thousand euros, blurring the line between what is art, what is collectible, and what is just a dirty sock that the auctioneer has just taken off his foot. SCARCE SIGNED and INSCRIBED by JANKOWSKI. About CHRISTIAN JANKOWSKI (from Wikipedia): ******Christian Jankowski (born 1968 in Göttingen, West Germany) is a contemporary multimedia artist who largely works with video, installation and photography. He lives and works in Berlin and New York. Jankowski's work has been associated with New Gothic Art and compared with artists like Rirkrit Tiravanija, Gillian Wearing, and Pierre Huyghe. Using various media formats, the collaborative nature of his practice is paramount as each participant unwittingly contributes his or her own texture to the work. The Hunt (1992), a performance video piece, is one of the artists earliest works. For one week the artist visited supermarkets and rather than select his goods as customary, he‘ hunted down’ his groceries, shooting each item with a children’s bow and arrow, accompanied by a friend with a video camera. For the 23-minute video Lycan Theorized (2006), Jankowski persuaded the cast and crew working in an actual straight-to-DVD werewolf movie to re-enact some of its most violent scenes while quoting the writings of various film theorists. The film Casting Jesus (2011) focuses on an audition to select an actor that best interprets the role of Jesus, judged by a jury of Vatican members. Jankowski has also created a number of television interventions. His video installation Telemistica was included in the 1999 Venice Biennale, and shows five Italian television fortune-tellers responding to a phoned-in question about the artist's potential success or failure at the upcoming Biennale. The Holy Artwork (2001) is a collaboration with a televangelist pastor from Texas. Jankowski's installation STRIP THE AUCTIONEER (2009) consists of sculpture, photographs and a video connected to a live auction that was orchestrated by the artist in May 2009. The action takes place at Christie's auction house in Amsterdam and incorporates the auctioneer, Amo Verkade, as the desired possession. Verkade bids his garment piece by piece down to his hammer. He strips himself of his suit, baring and transforming those parcels of clothing into objects of desire. Jankowski's videos, films, and installations have been exhibited internationally in places such as the Museum of Contemporary Art of Rome (2012), Nassauischer Kunstverein Wiesbaden (2009); Kunstmuseum Stuttgart (2008); Miami Art Museum, Miami (2007); List Visual Arts Center, Massachusetts (2005); Artpace, San Antonio (2001); and Wadsworth Atheneum, Hartford (2000). The artist participated in the 2002 Whitney Biennial and in the 48th Venice Biennale.******
