How can a friendly person like Helnwein stand making his - excellent - painting into a mirror of the terrors of this century? Or is it that he can't stand not doing it? Does his mirror just reflect the attitude of the century: Terror without end is better than an ending in terror...
Black Mirror
For Helnwein
A story by Stephen King. An American schoolboy, twelve or thirteen years old, fascinated, in his small-town monotony, by documents on the German concentration camps - the way his classmates are by Superman. The formula for his fascination: THEY JUST DID THOSE THINGS.
At his daily bus stop, he recognizes a face he has seen in photographs, under a black cap with death's insignia and above a black SS uniform. The boy blackmails the unidentified murderer into talking: HOW DID YOU DO THOSE THINGS. The murderer talks in order to save his life. Curiosity becomes the urge for real experience: the two of them found Murder, Inc. and rid the small town of dogs, tramps and other "unworthy life"...
How can a friendly person like Helnwein stand making his - excellent - painting into a mirror of the terrors of this century? Or is it that he can't stand not doing it?
Does his mirror just reflect the attitude of the century: TERROR WITHOUT END IS BETTER THAN ENDING IN TERROR, which comes form the over-evaluation of death, a consequence of tabooing it with statistics.
Wie hält ein freundlicher Mensch wie Helnwein es aus, seine - exzellente - Malerei zum Spiegel der Schrecken des Jahrhunderts zu machen?
Oder hält er es nicht aus, das nicht zu tun?
Reflektiert sein Spiegel nur die Jahrhunderthaltung, LIEBER EIN SCHRECKEN OHNE ENDE ALS EIN ENDE MIT SCHRECKEN, die aus der Überbewertung des Todes kommt, Folge seiner Tabuierung durch Statistik.
Perseus guillotines the Gorgon in the mirror, and when the head falls, it is his own. How many heads does a person/man have in our age of mirrors?
(translated from german original)
Heiner Müller wrote the essay "Black Mirror" 1986 in Berlin
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First publication in "Der Untermensch", 1987
Edition Braus Heidelberg
one man show “Der Untermensch”, Gottfried Helnwein, Self-portraits
Musée d’Art Moderne, Strasbourg, December, 1, 1986
=> Musée d’Art Moderne, Strasbourg, “Der Untermensch”, Gottfried Helnwein, Self-portraits, 1986
2nd publication:
"Selection - Neunter November Nacht", 1988
Museum Ludwig, Cologne
Musée de l'Elysée Lausanne
=> "Selection - Neunter November Nacht", 1988, Museum Ludwig, Cologne
