An exclusive encounter at the Maison Rouge/Fondation Antoine de Galbert with collector Artur Walther at the time of his exhibition Après Eden during Paris Photo week. A unique insight in to what fuels the passion of this former Goldman Sachs financier who left the profession in 1994 devote himself entirely to his obsession for photography.
“Collecting is not selfish”, as the following 5 points prove :
1. How do you give real coherence to such a collection (2,500 images) of time periods and geographic contexts that are so different?
As the exhibition at La maison rouge shows, there is a coherence to the collection, yet you can develop a range of thematic approaches from it. The collection is not one view on things. For example, we have done thematic exhibitions on African photography, looking at portraiture, identity, landscape, and so on. Another important theme has been archives, and the western or colonial gaze. In all these exhibitions, portraiture has been a common focus: thinking about the ‘self’ and asking who that ‘self’ is. Who are we, how do we understand ourselves, how do we present ourselves to others, how do we look at others? It is very much about the human, the being, and the self, but more than that, it’s about the specific, clearly defined landscapes and environments in which we locate ourselves. It’s not the landscape of the sublime and the beautiful, but of the history of mankind – of the intrusion of humanity into the landscape. And the other side of the coin is the cityscape: how do we live, how do we archive our living, and so on. What I think is special about the collection is its ability to bring together and contrast some of the great masters of photography from around the world. It is not a Western canvas, or a Western angle. The other interesting thing is that it explores these ideas over time, from Eadweard Muybridge or the first colonial images to today. And of course the concept of seriality is key.
2. Why and how did you reply to the invitation from Antoine de Galbert/Maison Rouge?
I’m a big fan of Antoine and La maison rouge. It’s a very unique place. I don’t know anywhere else where, as a collector, one is offered the space and given the freedom to work in the way that he allows here. You can construct every aspect of your exhibition in terms of the concept, the design, and the installation in the space. This is very special and unique. There is also a great team here. Plus, it’s great timing: Paris Photo has such an international audience and outlook, so it’s an interesting moment to present an exhibition with real historical depth, as we’re doing with our section on the 19th century history of the archive. As I said, we have had thematic exhibitions before, but to bring this all together in this way is really special. I feel very honored and very happy.
3. What inspired you to have an external review of your collection and to appoint independent curators?
I’ve always done that for every exhibition. We have a Project Space in New York with a very active program, and our major space is in Germany. I’ve always had a curator for the major exhibitions. I want the exhibitions to go into depth, to be thoroughly researched, and to be of scholarly significance. For that, I need experts. For each exhibition we also make a publication, as you can see in the vitrine at La maison rouge. I’ve looked at the collection myself in various ways, but to really expand perspectives on it, I wanted to engage somebody else who didn’t know the collection, and who came from a historical perspective, or from a perspective that begins with the works themselves. Simon Njami is one such person – a curator and a writer whose interests cover a lot of these works.
4. For the French public who had already discovered part of the collection in Arles through the exhibition “Typologie, taxinomie et classement sériel”, how does the exhibition “Après Eden” by Simon Njami differ or come close to it?
It’s more extensive than Arles, even though Arles was a huge exhibition. It brings up some similar topics, but it also makes other connections. In Arles we had only a small selection of African portraits; here we are bringing out this aspect of the collection much more strongly, and placing it in dialogue with questions of landscape, identity, and the archive. In Arles, work by Japanese artists was represented by the personal diaries of Nobuyoshi Araki and Kohei Yoshiyuki, but here we have expanded it with work by Daido Moriyama. We also close the exhibition with a video installation by Yang Fudong, which takes it to another level. The other difference is that in Arles it was all about series and sequences, but here we are really drawing out connections between the sequences. The space where Seydou Keïta is connected to Richard Avedon is truly remarkable, truly unique. I don’t think many people will have seen so many portraits in such a condensed and yet extensive way – these whole bodies of work representing slices of society, in all its various groupings and transitions. I keep revisiting this section. It’s unbelievable – very different from Arles. The exhibition also becomes denser and denser when you go downstairs. When you get to the end, you need to take a deep breath!
5. What changes have you noted in the course of your multiple commitments with regard to the role and the place of the collector?
Personally, thinking back over the years, I started to collect very slowly with works by the Bechers, Sander, and Blossfeldt. It started very gradually and took a number of years. Then I made trips to China, and again it took me a long time before I bought any works by Chinese artists. After that, I felt I had developed a kind of understanding of what was going on there. By researching and talking with curators and artists and scholars, your knowledge goes deeper and deeper. That’s very important to me: the more you do, the more you know, the more you compare. So now, the process has become something else – it’s become much faster, at least in terms of collecting. But collecting and having an exhibition space are quite different, because with an exhibition space you have to fill a program, and that program must make sense. It’s interesting talking with Antoine, because Antoine is a collector but he makes the space available for others. I have been taking a different approach, by making exhibitions out of the collection. For example, with the New York Project Space, I’m investigating, researching, and experimenting around certain themes, concepts, and ideas, which I then draw on to collect and exhibit in a broader and also more intimate way. The collection is very focused and is expanding fast. The third thing is the publication program, which expands our activities into another dimension. By showing work in a certain space you can reach a specific audience of interested people, but having a publication enables you to reach a wider universe of people and interests all over the world. By travelling the exhibition you can also do the same thing. To conclude, yes, my role and activities have changed dramatically!
EXHIBITION
Après Eden
Collection Artur Walther
Curator : Simon Najmi
From October 17th, 2015 to January 17th, 2016
La maison rouge
Fondation Antoine de Galbert
10 bd de la bastille
75012 Paris
France.
33 (0) 1 40 01 08 81
[email protected]
www.lamaisonrouge.org
