Beijing’s Central Academy of Fine Arts Art Museum has issued a statement saying it will open its exhibition Anselm Kiefer in China as planned tomorrow (19 November), against the artist’s protests that the exhibition was organised without his consent. The statement places responsibility for communication with Kiefer upon the German organisers, the Bell Art Center and the Ludwig Museum Koblenz, and says that the Chinese institution is within its legal rights to stage the show. The dispute has meanwhile sparked a social media firestorm within the Chinese art world, as artists and curators debate the ethics and legality of an august local institution ignoring the express interests of an artist beloved here.
CAFA Art Museum today issued a five-point statement in Chinese, beginning: “We note the report about ‘Anselm Kiefer calls for his first exhibition in China to be cancelled’ by The Art Newspaper. “First, ‘the German organiser of Anselm Kiefer in China indicates that all art works in this exhibition have been authorised by individual and institutional collectors. This exhibition complies with relevant laws.” Second, the organisers told the institution that the exhibition’s main curator, Ludwig Museum Koblenz’s director Beate Reifenscheid, contacted Kiefer several times to solicit his involvement, and was rebuffed.
The statement stresses that the museum’s “admiration for and recognition of Mr. Kiefer and his artistic achievements” motivated its partnership on holding and touring the exhibition in China. It was “after the execution of the agreement with the German organiser [that] we learned that Mr. Kiefer disagreed with holding this exhibition, but in consideration of the legality of the exhibits, we have no reason to stop our cooperation with the German organiser. We deeply regret that Mr. Kiefer has not directly participated in the exhibition or came to China again to make this exhibition…. As an important art academy and art museum in China, we hope that we will have further cooperation and exchange with Mr. Kiefer in the future.”
The Art Newspaper has been unable to reach the Chinese co-curator and CAFA Art Museum director Wang Huangsheng for comment, but since the article broke yesterday, he has told the Chinese media company Phoenix Art: “We always urged the German organisers to communicate better with Kiefer. The sources of the works this time are from Kiefer’s biggest private collection and the German Ludwig Museum Koblenz. The organiser said that they would settle this problem with the artist.” Wang says he is unclear what Kiefer’s concerns are with the show are. “CAFA and its art museum think this exhibition is workable as long as the organiser believes it has no problem in legal and procedural fields.” Wang says that he and CAFA’s director Fan Di’an have wanted to host a Kiefer show for a decade, but lacked the resources. “Fan Di’an’s opinion is that we should talk about the problems after we enjoy the exhibition. This will be a great exhibition. The German organiser spent a lot of money on it, and CAFA Art Museum is lucky to have this opportunity.”
The Art Newspaper's initial article, and Chinese-language translations of and reactions to it, have gone viral on Chinese social media WeChat since breaking yesterday, with artists and curators supporting Kiefer’s prerogative to control where his work is shown, while staff of institutions highlight the dilemma CAFA Art Museum faces. The artist Lin Tianmiao posted: “I visited Kiefer in his Paris studio, and he cared a great deal about exhibiting in China. His wife visited China twice to research possible locations, so he is very meticulous about doing a big exhibition in China. If a collector organises the first exhibition, it damages the artists’ scheduled plans. He is too powerful of an artist…to just show in a university art museum.” Moreover, she writes: “We should look at the legal rules: he is a great artist, who himself has said, ‘I don’t like George W.Bush, I won’t exhibit in the US for those eight years.'".
The curator Penny Liu, who recently organised K11’s Bagism show, posted: “If collectors do not respect the wishes of artists, even just about showing, there is little artists can do. So it is important who buys a work and who they resell to, and there are too many examples that suggest in this case the artist is hamstrung.” She highlights Article 18 of Chinese copyright law, which states: “Transfer of ownership of the original copy of an art work, etc shall not be deemed as transfer of copyright, but the exhibition right for the original copy of the art work shall belong to the owner of the original copy.”
In contrast, Minsheng Art Museum Beijing’s public education commissioner Liu Jiao says: “As museum practitioners, we understand how difficult it is to run an exhibition space. If you have not put in money and cannot contribute constructive suggestions, you should save your saliva.”