Hans Ulrich Obrist
Category: Curator
Nationality: Swiss
Last Year: 35
Anyone can do a lot; not everyone can do a lot and consistently do it well. Even fewer can keep doing it well, year upon year; and of those who can, nobody does more, better, than Hans Ulrich Obrist. When the Swiss dynamo issued a sixpoint curatorial statement relating to his Beijing Mini-Marathon in December 2008, the first point was: ‘Don’t stop. We never stop’. It’s clearly the ubiquitous curator’s axiom, and Obrist’s third year of juggling a full quota of freelance work with his job as co-director of exhibitions (to abbreviate his extensive title) at the Serpentine Gallery found him continuing at full, burnout-defying speed. In the London institution, working alongside Julia Peyton-Jones, he helped shape a diverse programme of solo shows ranging from glossy (Jeff Koons) to oblique (Rebecca Warren), from old (Gustav Metzger, b. 1926) to young (Luke Fowler, b. 1978), and continued his mission to introduce the West to the East via December’s lively group show, Indian Highway – mounted shortly after Obrist jetted back from the East himself, having cocurated the 3rd Yokohama Triennial. Then, from highways to Unbuilt Roads, this being the title of his springtime exhibition dedicated to 107 artists’ unfinished projects (an Obrist obsession) at e-flux’s project space in New York. Enough? No. Add the publication of Obrist’s illuminating interviews books, A Brief History of Curating and On Curating; the acclaimed restaging of his and Philippe Parreno’s ‘time-based exhibition’, Il Tempo del Postino (2007), at Art Basel. Factor in Daniel Birnbaum’s Venice Biennale, whose concerns with networks and globalism strongly reflected an ongoing dialogue with Obrist. Add the lectures, the predawn Starbucks seminars (aka the Brutally Early Club), the panel discussions, the – wait, can I have another 250 words, please?
Dear Ruth,
It will be my pleasure to send you the jpeg image of the painting but I’ll need your email address, where I can attach almost 8 mb file of it.
The virtual “Windows” is our real window to the outside world, so I think it won’t be difficult to get in touch.
I thank you for your interest.
With kind regards,
Filomina Pawar.
Dear Ruth Hinks,
Greetings.
Thank you very much for your interest in seeing Eric G. C. Weets’ painting.
It would be my pleasure to send you the image, I just would need your email address. I am not sure if one can give their email id here, in any case mine is: filomina_pawar@yahoo.co.uk
If you could just send me a test mail, I will reply with the image. It is almost 8 mb in size. In the meantime if you wish you can watch a video of this painting at the following link:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xaiwXpgk9tg or google the title of the painting, “90 days from B to C”.
I hope you come back here to check this mail.
With kind regards,
Filomina Pawar.
Dear Filomina,
I would very much like to see a jpeg image of the oil painting by Eric G. C. Weets please. I’m studying for a BA(Hons)Design at Glasgow School of Art and am currently writing my dissertation on Art and Celebrity and so would be very interested to see a painting made by a person who is an outsider and not been influenced by the worlds of art and celebrity.
Thank you,
Best wishes,
Ruth Hinks
Greetings,
I wonder, if an artist is an outsider, self taught, living far away from the art scene (believing any outside interference will disturb his mind and thereby the work he is occupied with) and who has, after 50 years of life research, come up with on original style and unique work, how would his work be noticed?
I am contacting the contemporary art curators, critics, museum directors, private collectors and anybody who is somehow related with the art world.
The unique problem I am facing is, the original work, which measures 182 x 487 cms and saturated with many many details (its like hundreds of painting in one big painting.) cannot be grasped and does not have the desired impact when one is standing in front of the original work because I am sending a jpeg image attached with the email to them which is then opened and seen on the monitor.(if at all it is opened and seen)
The work, is an oil painting, titled, “90 days from B to C”, made by Eric G. C. Weets in 2007. Artist is Belgian but is residing in Asia, mostly in India, for the last 20 years or so.
If anybody is interested to see the painting, discover a new talent of 21st century, for just wants to be kept up to date with the new work being done today or have an idea how to get the work noticed, please drop a line, I will send a jpeg image or if desired, a C print on paper, of the painting and will acknowledge their contribution in my memoirs……I believe this is history in the making.
Thanks for your time to read this and if you know anybody who would be interested, please forward this mail.
With best regards,
Filomina Pawar.
PS. If this email get to Mr. Obrist, I have already send an email to Lorraine and waiting on her reply. The last time I followed up with her over telephone, she mentioned she didn’t, yet, had the time to show it to Mr. Obrist.