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DanielBuren

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MllB[ and more, the subject

ofan exhibition tends not be the display ofarnvorks, but

the exhibition of the exhibition as awork of an. Here, the Documenta team, headed
by Harald Szeemann, exhibits (arnvorks) and exposes itself (to critiques).

The works presented are carefully chosen touches of color in the tableau* that
composes each section (room) as awhole.
There is even an order to these coiors, these being defined and arranged according to the
drawn design*u ofthe section (selection) inwhichtheyare spread out/presented.

These sections (castrations), themselves carefully chosen "touches of color" in the

tableau that makes up the exhibition as awhole and in its veryprinciple, only appear
by placing themselves under the wing of the organizer, who reunifies aft by rendering it equivalent everywhere in the case/screen that he prepares for it.
The organizer assumes the contradictions; it is he who safeguards them.

exhibition establishes itself as its own subject, and its own

subject as a work of art. The exhibition is the '\ralorizing receptacle" in which art is
played out and founders, because even ifthe arlwork was formerly revealed thanks
to the museum, it now serves as nothing more than a decorative gimmick for the

It

I
i

is true, then, that the

survival ofthe museum as tableau, a tableau whose author is none other than the

exhibition organizer.
And the artist throws her- or himself and her or his work into this trap, because the
artist and her or his work, which are powerless from the force ofhabit ofart, have no
choice but to allow another to be exhibited: the organizer.
Hence, the exhibition as atableau of art, as the limit of the exhibition of art.
Thus, the limits art has created for itself, as shelter, turn against it by imitating it,
and the refuge that the

limits of art had constituted are revealed

as its

justification,

reality, andtomb.

D.B.,Februaryr97z
@ Daniel Buren

Translator's noter The French word tableau hs multiple meanings; it can re{er to a painting, a scene, a chart, a lable, a board,
a picture. Since there is no adequate English translation for Buren's literal and metaphorical use of the word here, il is preferable to retain the original.

.. Translatols notei Buren uses the word dess(e)i4 a combination of dessi4 drawing, and dessem, plan or design,

2t1

$IY do I precede this

Simplybecause it see

[[|HERE

be curated by an arc
absolutely linked-

Thirry-mo years ag

ANE

exhibitionwas tie fu
but excessive, and hl
claimedwas exclusrr.
of the largest numlre

produce the most il.l

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even,

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DanielBuren

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$lY do I precede this brief reflectionwith

texr rhat is more than thirryyears old?

simplybecause it seems thatthe question/proposition"shouldthe next Documenta

be curated by an artist?" and what I wrote int97z about another Documenta are
absolutely linked.

Thirry-ffio years ago, Harald szeemann-who as the general organizer of the

exhibition was the first to be concerned by this texr-found it intelligent, naturally,
but excessive, and hundreds ofleagues away from his personal attitude, which he
claimed was exclusively that of a person who, after having analyzed the production
of the largest number of living artists, was choosing those who seemed to him to
produce the most interesting works and, from there, was putting them together in
the most suitable manner by arranging their works in the best possible fashion and
even, often,byfollowingthe desires ofthosewho knowbest howto express them.

what could be more natural than this response? It

is a bit like a good deed. The perfect organizer's good deed. There is no reference to the personality ofthe organizer
in this declaration, nor any pretension to "create" the event. This implies that if
there is an event, the invited artists will have created it, not the organizer!

Nevertheless, and despite his comments or his denials, my text indicated and could
not have invented that other things were already at play.
These are things which H. s., more than any other organizer of the period, had already brought to light, since he was by far the most gifted and easily the best of his
time (and ofthose who, afterward, tried to imitate him) in the realm ofgroup exhibi-

tions. Hence, it seems to me, the accuracy of the text "Exhibition of an Exhibition,"
which analyzed the possible perverse effects oflarge group exhibitions that were
emerging at the stan of the most promising exhibition organizef s career.
Judging from a tendency that could already be felt in tgTz,today we can assert rhat

the proclivity ofmost exhibition organizers is to conform as exactly as possible to

what this text was already anticipating. so much so that it has become a sort of srylistic epidemic, an anisdcgenre in itself, arampant competitioninwhichth eorganizer
proclaims as loudly as possible that he or she is the ar-tist of the exhibition, and to
such an extentthat Harald Szeemann, who found myr97z text attributingto himthe

2t3

The

BiennialRder

role ofprincipal artist ofthe exhibition inappropriate, today claims to be an "author

ofexhibitions,"undoubtedlyout offear ofbeingoutdone and of appearing simplylike
a nice organizer from the past. However, one must be careful to not misunderstand;
the big change in this late-coming proclamation is not that Harald Szeemann has
transformed the way in which he has conceived of his exhibitions, nor that he has
over-personalized everl,thing he has undertaken. It is simpiy that, at the end of the
sixties and at the beginning ofthe seventies, no exhibition organizer concernedwith
his or her career would have dared claim out loud that theywere the authors ofwhat
ever exhibition they were in charge of, and they would have been even less inclined

to claim theywere the artists! Even ifit had been the case, to say so would have denigrated the invited artists, who would not have hesitated to let them know in no uncertainterms, andwhowouldhave undoubtediyrebelled. Buttimeshave changed (fig. t):
We have come fu1l circle and the generalized passivity of artists in the face of this

situation is even more serious than it was thirly years ago. Since if in r97z thev
could still turn a deaf ear and a blind eye to the ways in which they were being used.
the straightfor"wardness of our epoch (which others might call clmicism) makes it
entirely improbable that anists today do not know what is being plotted and what is
being declared and the kinds ofdiscourses surrounding them!
Just as it is hard to know if the chicken or the egg came flrst, it is also diffrcult to make

out if this situation stems from the suicidal passlvity of artists, automatically engendering organizers capable ofbypassing or even replacingthem at a moment's notice.

or if the artists, having other fish to fry when confronted with the impertinence o:
certain organizers/manipulators, would have literally pushed themselves to the side
by disparagingly watching the spectacular emphasis of the exhibition organizer tc
his own detriment, and above

a1i

to the detriment of hls work as the exclusive center

of the exhibition, which it naturally should be, for better or for worse.

2U

Today, it is possible to imagine that we are not far-off from having a large-scale international exhibition directed by a great organizer-author who proposes the flrs:

exhibition without any artists at

a1ll

Enough of these nightmares, and without wanting to specifu all of the reasons fc:
such a slippage here, it is certain, however, that the affirmation ofone (the organizer
as author or artist) and the passivity/acceptance ofthe other (the work ofart as a

,.1i

Where Are the Artisls?

Daniel Buren

i*
-t

215

'l
Harald Szeemann at Documenta 5, 972

The

BinnialRdq

colored stroke in a large fresco that escapes him or her) are two sides ofthe same
problem: the present crisis of living an and how it is shown.

'n:rc:ar: :r s:c: ;..

It is also, in most cases, proofthat the couple "organizer versus invited artists" is no
longer homogenous, but one that looks even more like a forced marriage just asking
to be broken up. All the more so since, as everyone today knows, this infernal cou-

iritmfiir t:[ :r::es--

ple is made up of one who dominates and one who is dominated. The same people
always play these roles, without any possibility for reversal. The former are always
more dominating while the latter are always more dominated.

lf{fil1llI5

R)rman's works on pink walls under the pretext of

innovation!

I also have to assert here, so as not to be

misunderstood, that I cannot imagine for one

second an ambitious group exhibitionwithout an organizer. The role ofthe organizer
is very imporrant in the selection and the mise-en-scdne, when it is necessary and
it seems impossible to me to do without it. The organizer exists and must continue
to exist. I am not callinginto question their existence,just their manner ofexisting.
However, the problem underscored above-that is, the meaningless, because excessive, domination exercised by the author or artist-organizer-is even more crucial
with regard to large-scale international exhibitions today; from Kassel to Venice,

from Lyon to Istanbul, this has been evident for years. All ofthe large-scaie international exhibitions are currentlyin a state ofcrisis, and I would not be surprised ifone

ofthe major causes

is the problem we are concerned with here: the reversal ofroles

ratiEring the organizer as author and the ar-tist as interpreter.

nr',qilmmmr-

21

seems to me that the current situation is not movingin this direction; onthe contrary-.

shadow of the invited artists.

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we want to personalize everything, spectacularize everything, and individualize

everything to the extreme. we no longer accept that the organizer remain in the

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Is it possible todayto do without the organizer-artist or the organizer-author and retum to the organizer-interpreter? In the absolute, the response is yes, ofcourse, bur it

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However, if most invited artists were to refuse the role assumed by cenain exhibition organizers, it is worth betting that theywould no longer work in the atrocious
way that some of them have been working, and we would never again see Robert

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VVlEre Are the

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BUH

Daniel

trend we can understand better why, with the help of laziness,

organizers/authors have attained such importance in relation to the selected aftists. Instead of studying the dozens and dozens ofworks presented, we can simply
transfer all interest, criticism inciuded, onto the shoulders of a single person' the
In the face of such

organizer-authorl What a relief! We put a1l of the works in the same basket and we
throw praise or criticism at whomever has put them in it and carries it; that is, the
author of the compilation. And just as we go from compilation to compilation, we go
from exhibition to exhibition, taking off or adding one or two pieces just as we take

offoradd

singer ortwofrom

compact disc.Andthereyouhave itlWe are made to

believe that we have an entirely new exhibition every timel

So, the

question remains: How do we get out of this cul-de-sac, this vicious circle?

From this perspective, your question has the advantage of redistributing the cards.
Could a large-scale exhibition like Documenta be entrusted to an artist? If the
tendencyremarkeduponhere continues to hold, myresponse wouldundoubtedlybe
,fres." For the artist-organizer would erase the faults inherent in the organizer-artist.
Forexample,itwouldbeworthbettingthatthe announcement of an aftist-organizer,
whoever he or she might be, would cause an immense outcry of lamentations from
the choir ofthe majority ofall the other panic-stricken and destabilized artists.
This will be a varied and serious song. Its reasons for being will be intelligent, stupid, and revealing at the same time. They will be founded on jealousy on the one
hand, and fear of the artist-organizer's positions on the other. Artists, exacerbated
individualists if ever they existed, would show that their corporatlst spirit is not as
remote as it may seem. One would notice, then, that the critiques suddenly raised
by the announcement of the name of an attist-or ganizer had never been raised by
the announcement ofany organizer-artist. This a priori predictable reaction already
bears within itseifthe fruits ofextremely positive debates, for they reveal a state of
fact that has been occulted for over thirtyyears.

Undoubtedly other kinds of faults inherent to the choice of the artist in question
would crop up, but given that an experiment of this sort has yet to be attempted
(apan from much more modest experiments undertakenhere andtherebyartists as
different as Duchamp or even Kosuth or myself), it seems abittoo earlyto mention it.
What other reasons-besides opening up a real debate-are there for welcoming an

2I

The
Biennial Reader

artist-organizer, eventhough such a possibilitywould certainiynot be revolutionary?

First and foremost, an initiative ofthis sort couldbringthe dulled, even anesthetized,
anistictribe out ofthe torporithasbeeninforyears now. Second, it seems to me that
the artist in question would continue working as usuai but in another way, and this
parameter alone would immediately al1ow for a clear perspective on the exhibition
itself, both for the artists who would accept or refuse such an invitation and for those
(amateurs and professionals) who would critique the exhibition once it opened.
Notv, this putting into perspective with regard to aftistic work over the long term,

verifiable in the works, does not exist when an exhibition organizer, whatever his
or her talent, suddeniy becomes an organizer-araist or author of an exhibitlon. His
or her talent is linked to nothing else than the exhibition in question and the theme
he or she has decided to develop, which in most cases is a bit too insubstantial to
be a "work"l However, the theme chosen by the usual organizer-author, which will
enable commentators to exercise their eloquence, is never remarked upon by the

invited artists, whether it interests them or not. They will just as soon agree to participate in the exhibition ofanother (or the same) author-organizer that develops a
diametrically opposed theme, which their (same) works will aim to illustrate as well
(that is,

as

poorly)

as

the preceding exhibition, period, and so on.

Ifexhibition organizers todaydefendthe status ofauthorit means thattheyconsider

that the work resides in the exhibition produced (which becomes their work) and
that, as I wrote intgTz,tlrre exhibited works, the fragments that make up the corpus
ofthis exhibition, are not really arrworks but have become, at best, accents, pafticular details in the serrrice of the work in question, the exhibition of our organizerauthor. At the same time-and this is where the problem has become pointed
enough to create the crisis in which we flnd ourselves-the "fragments" and other

210

"details" exhibited are, by definition and in most cases, completely and entirely foreign to the principal work in which they are participating, that is, the exhibition in
question. On the other hand, if the organizer of the exhibition is a full-time anist,
lt is wonh betting that he or she will take enormous risks and that his or her vision
will be more explicit, less neutral, more engaged; in a word, it will make more sense
than that of an organizer by profession, whether or not he or she proclaims him- or
herself an author. The latter will only be able to work by using the work of others or,
if you 1ike, byusingwork that is docile enough to f,t into their own discourse, which
strongly risks correspondlng to current, fashion, or tastes.

Whffi

tfE A,'tists?
Danid BUH

Are

For at least thirry years now there have been abundant examples of organizers rigging up group exhibitions in their own way in order to make '$,iorks"; and their own

wayis not always up to the works employed, to saythe least. A1l the more so because,
in most cases, their "works" are nothingbut even more large-scale imitations of certain artistic movements or research that they pillage for their own benef,t, r,r-Llgarize, and. attach to all of the invited artists, who, generally lacking in mistrust, flnd
themselves cursed with a costume that does not f,t them, when it isn't a big red nose

that the organizer-author/clown has placed smack in the middle of their face. At
least with an organizer chosen from among artists (those capable of assuming and
willing to take on such a delicate and dangerous role would ceitainly not be very numerous !) we would know a little bit more precisely the spirit in which they position
themselves in relationship to the world. We could read the exhibition with much
more perspective and more seriously than we seem to be able to do under the reign

ofthe organizer-authors. At least, I think so.

Yet, why does such a possibiliry (that an

anist organize the next Documenta) seem

so originai and so surprising, even improbable, once

it

is considered in the space

of

the plastic arts, whereas, priori, it would not pose any problems in other cultural
realms? Without pretending to respond to this strange situation, it could be usefui
a

to look around andto tryto understandwhywhat maybe evident elsewhere is hardly

conceivable here.

Who is most often nominated to be the head of an opera house? A highly skilled musician (interpreter, composer, or director ofan orchestra, or all ofthose things at
once). Is an artist, a painter or sculptor, nominated to run an important museum?
Never. Actors, directors, authors, or Someone who engages in a1l three activities
are frequentlyhired to run theaters. Are lMng artists nominated to mn art centers?
Never. Publishing houses often entrust complete collections-from the choice of
authors to the wdting of

texts-to a writer, a philosopher, a novelist,

or an essayist.

Are artists named directors or edltors-in-chief of an magazines? Neverl

It is not rare to flnd writers, playn'rights, musicians, and directors in charge of rubrics treating literature, theater, music, and cinema in journals, magazines, or other
reviews. Is it possible to find an afi criticism column written by an artist? Neverl

219

The

BiqnialRder

The only exception to this quasi-generalized and systematic exclusion of ar-tists

from positions in which decisions are made is in the very area inwhich theywork: art
schools. Why? Ir's a mystery!

There are s,-::

thinking.":b::
scale exhibri:

The aim ofthese reflections is not to study the reasons for the absence ofartists on
the front lines of all of the domains cited above, where certain of them, if it were possible and ifthey so desired, could undoubtedly have their place. yet, ifwe wager that

uiaterer tl;_:

we could decipher the reasons, would we be any closer to knowing what an artist is
today? what is their role in society? what do we offer them and why? what do we

or her prc:e.sobrious tha: --:

never offer them and why? what role do we assign to them, realty? And why does
their place seem to become even more restricted as time goes by?

,\nd if

Given the far from briiliant state that contemporary art finds itself in today, it seems

hibitcr l::. :

above, and pe:

If it

is incs:.=:

tils:.

Thereiore.
entirely appropriate that cer-tain ar-tists couid asser-t their presence exactlywhere it
is never solicited. The organizers/authors/anists oflarge-scale exhibitioris provide
results we already know: Documenta transformed into a circus (Jan Hoet) or even
as a

platform for the promotion ofcurators who profit from the occasion in order

to publish their thesis in the form ofa caraiogue (catherine David) or as a tribune in
favor of the developing politically correct world (okwui Enwezor) or other exhibi-

\iaether

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doing so, at least they should not add to the taste for such banality the pretension
of calling themselves an "author" by generalizing the attitudes of artists who have
alreadyproved themselves elsewhere on the scale of an entire exhibition.
To be an organizer-author is surely not to make fun of art at its own expense, especially since there are already a good number of anists who do so quite well and thus
one is only shamelessly imitating them.

-rre

::

<:.np-l :r i :=-.

others, undoubtedlytoo influenced bythe history ofart ofyesterday and today, forget that even if they do admire the gesture of a creator iike Duchamp for having put
a mustache on a fake Mona Lisa, or the research of artists like sylvie Fleury
or John
Armleder, this does not give them the right to hang a Bernard Buffet on a soi Le witt
wail drawing, or to place a doghouse sold by Gucci in front ofa claude Lev6que., In

22t

:l;

i\ Lri A 1L\i

tions by organizer-authors trying to provide new merchandise to the ever voracious

western market for art consumption, which, like all markets, must ceaselessly and
rapidly renew itself in order not to succumb, hence, in order to bring about: Magz'cians of theEathbyJ. H. Martin, the chinese andthe breathless.!outh-ism,,of H.
s.

--::

:_-

Where Are the Arlists?

Daniel Buren

There are swarms of examples of doubtful worth and I think, at such a level of "nonthinking," that occasionally putting an artist (or several artists) in charge of a large-

exhibition like Documenta would help to redistribute the cards' as I indicated

above, and perhaps help us to see the questions that living artists today are posing,
scale

whatever their age, a bit more clearly.

is indispensable that every organizer play a creative role when exercising his
or her profession (whether they are artists themselves or curators), then it is less
obvious that the result ofthis creativity, the exhibition produced, is a work in itself.

Ifit

And if this is the case, what about the "works" that make it up?

Therefore, the question that remains, and the one worth asking, is whether an exhibition that brings together a large number of different amvorks can become a

'fuork" itself.
Whether the response is yes or no, from the moment that a group exhibition is
signed and defended by a veritable author who would also be, for the space ofthis
exhibition, its organizer, strong evidence would be given on this subject that oniy an

artist, it seems to me, can provide today.

@ Daniel Buren

Previously published as: "Exhibition oI

lt0Trs

an Exhibition," Documenta 5: Befra-

- Bildwelten heute,
ed. Harald Szeemann, exh. cal. Kassel,
l\y'useum Fridericianum, 1 972, Section

gung der Realftet

17, p. 29; and "Where Are the Artisis?" in Jens Hoffmann (ed.), Ihe Nexl
Dacumenta Shauld Be Curated by an
Artlst (New York and Frankfud, 2004),
pp.26-31.

Generallyspeaking,theartmag-

aines created and linanced by

artists
themselves are those whose editors-inforthe
do
eveMhing
chief or associates
magaine, and those that are published
irregularly and that never fail to coliapse
(which does diminish their quality).

This is in relerence to an exhibi-

tion in Avignon during the summer ol

2003 signed by Eric Troncy, organizerauthor o1 the exhibition.

221