Hans-Jürgen Schult (born 24 June 1939), known professionally as HA Schult, is a German installation, happening and conceptual artist known primarily for his object and performance art and more specifically his work with garbage. He is one of the first artists to deal with the world's ecological imbalance in his workChristoph Stiegemann (ed.), HA Schult: Die Zeit und Der Müll, exhibition catalog, Diözesanmuseum Paderborn, 2013, p. 3."Er gilt als einer der ersten Künstler, der das ökologische Ungleichgeicht in den Mittelpunkt seiner Arbeit stellte." See "HA Schult machte B. Braun zum Kunstwerk", HNA, June 22, 2015. and has therefore been called an "eco-art pioneer". His best known works include the touring work, Trash People,David Sim, "A Load of Rubbish: Eco-Artist HA Schult's Trash People Sculptures", International Business Times, April 2, 2014. which exhibited on all continents,Stiegemann (ed.), HA Schult: Die Zeit und Der Müll, pp. 43-44, 64-91. and the Save The Beach hotel, a building made of garbage.Stiegemann (ed.), HA Schult: Die Zeit und Der Müll, pp. 31, 170-173.
Life HA Schult was born in Parchim, Mecklenburg. He studied art at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf from 1958 to 1961, where he was a student of Georg Meistermann, Joseph Fassbender, and Karl Otto Götz.Christoph Stiegemann (ed.), HA Schult: Die Zeit und Der Müll, exhibition catalog, Diözesanmuseum Paderborn, 2013, pp. 40-41. Among his fellow students were Gotthard Graubner, Kuno Gonschior"An der Kunstakademie in Düsseldorf studiert er [Kuno Gonschior] von 1957 bis 1961 in der Malklasse von Karl Otto Götz zusammen mit Gotthard Graubner und HA Schult." See Museumsplattform NRW: Kuno Gonschior . and, in 1961, Sigmar Polke, Gerhard Richter, and Franz Erhard Walther.Christoph Stiegemann (ed.), HA Schult: Die Zeit und Der Müll, exhibition catalog, Diözesanmuseum Paderborn, 2013, p. 41.Oliver Kornhoff and Barbara Nierhoff write about Götz: "1959-1979 professor at the Academy of Fine Arts Düsseldorf. His first students are Gotthard Graubner, HA Schult and Kuno Gonschior. Followed in 1961 by Gerhard Richter, Sigmar Polke, and Franz Erhard Walther." ("1959-1979 Professur an der Kunstakademie Düsseldorf. Seine ersten Schüler sind Gotthard Graubner, H. A. Schult und Kuno Gonschior. 1961 folgen Gerhard Richter, Sigmar Polke und Franz Erhard Walther.") See Oliver Kornhoff and Barbara Nierhoff, Karl Otto Götz: In Erwartung blitzschneller Wunder, exh. cat., Arp Museum, Remagen (Kerber Christof Verlag, 2010), p. 114.compArt: Karl Otto Götz."In the early 1960s I studied painting at the Düsseldorf Academy of Fine Arts, together with today's great painters such as Gotthard Graubner, Sigmar Polke and Gerhard Richter." ("Ich habe Anfang der 60er-Jahre an der Kunstakademie Düsseldorf mit heutigen Malergrößen wie Gotthard Graubner, Sigmar Polke und Gerhard Richter Malerei studiert.") See Axel Griesch, "Müllkünstler HA Schult: Ich möchte Unsterblichkeit. Und die ist nicht käuflich", finanzen.net, 13 May 2012."Beim Studium in Düsseldorf lernte Schult spätere Erfolgskünstler wie Gotthard Graubner, Sigmar Polke und Gerhard Richter kennen." See Roberto Di Bella, "Porträt des Kölner Aktionskünstlers HA Schult", Köln Reporter At that time, he was mainly inspired by three artists: Yves Klein, Georges Mathieu and Jackson Pollock."HA Schult: Aktionskünstler, im Gespräch mit Sabine Reeh." Alpha-Forum, BR-Online, 3 January 2003.
From 1962 to 1967 he worked as an art director for a German bank and some industrial companies. From 1967 to 1978 he lived as an artist in Munich and has also performed a range of diversified jobs over time, including a spell as a taxi driver. During the late 1970s Schult lived in Cologne and from 1980 to 1986 chiefly in New York City, where he became acquainted with Roy Lichtenstein and Robert Rauschenberg.See Christoph Stiegemann (ed.), HA Schult: Die Zeit und Der Müll, exhibition catalog, Diözesanmuseum Paderborn, 2013, p. 41. However, Schult had problems establishing a reputation as an artist in the US, which he attributed to his criticism of America's consumption-driven mentality.Philip Krohn, "HA Schult, Der Müllkünstler", Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 3 August 2009. He moved back to Germany in 1986. Schult has been situated in Cologne since 1990.
His son is the German film director, Kolin Schult. Schult was married to Elke Koska for 25 years, who Schult considers his museSandra Ebert and Alex Schwaiger, "Muse von HA Schult: Elke Koska und der Umzug des Grauens", Express, 21 November 2010. - she was also (and still is) his manager, now in cooperation with Anna Zlotovskaya, the Russian classical violinist, Schult married in 2010."HA Schult hat geheiratet", schwäbische.de, 3 November 2010
Field of art Schult works in the tradition of Pop Art, being influenced by commercial advertising and a critical view of consumerism,José Pierre, DuMont's kleines Lexikon der Pop Art (Cologne: DuMont, 1978), pp. 126-127. but also creates happenings. Peter Ludwig from the Museum Ludwig, Cologne, says: "The entire art movement of the sixties, which was combined under the expression Pop Art, was nothing more than the large-scale attempt to bring art back into a very close relationship with life. ... An action like the one by HA Schult follows here the same line, the attempt to fuse art and life again into one unit, which of course still gives the individual the liberty to accept this as art or not."See Christoph Stiegemann (ed.), HA Schult: Die Zeit und Der Müll, exhibition catalog, Diözesanmuseum Paderborn, 2013, p. 138.Diözesanmuseum Paderborn: Die Zeit und der Müll: Trash-Kunst und Konsumkritik. For instance, in Cologne, a happening staged by Schult involving "19 luxury cars worth a total of over 4 million marks (1.8 million dollars)" caused what was described by one source as the "world's most expensive traffic jam".news24: The world's most expensive traffic jam. However, Schult primarily uses trash as an artistic material both for his object art and happenings. The artist calls himself a "Macher",Hermann Glaser, Kulturgeschichte der Bundesrepublik Deutschland: Zwischen Protest und Anpassung 1968-1989 (1989), p. 63.Heiner Stachelhaus, "Achtung! Der Macher geht um! HA Schult in Essen". In Auf den Punkt gebracht: Heiner Stachelhaus, Kunstkritiken 1963 bis 1985 (1985), p. 93. a German word that can mean a "maker" or "worker." According to David Sim, Kim Levin and others, Schult's public extravaganzas have been compared with those of Christo"HA Schult's giant public artworks have been likened to those by Christo." See David Sim, "A Load of Rubbish: Eco-Artist HA Schult's Trash People Sculptures", International Business Times, April 2, 2014."Conceptual artist HA Schult has been called the 'German Christo' for the epic scale of his work." See "HA Schult: Beautiful Trash", Deutsche Welle: Inspired Minds. and Jeff Koons."Mit seinen Trash-Objekten stellt HA Schult sich in die Tradition der Pop Art und ihren Angriffen auf mediale Vermittlungsstrategien, Werbung, auf manipulative Vermittlungsstrategien und Gleichschaltungsprozesse. Bei HA Schult geschieht dies meist mit selbstinszenatorischen Impetus und lässt ihn in der Kunstkritik bisweilen in die Nähe von Christo oder Jeff Koons rücken." See Museumsplattform NRW: HA Schult. Schult describes himself as an ardent proponent of the "new ecological consciousness" and was referred to as an "eco-art pioneer" by Washington Post writer Rachel Beckman. Art historian Jens Christian Jensen wrote about Schult: "I do not know another German artist who grasps his tasks so comprehensively, no one who has such a sense of feeling for that what matters in our times. In HA Schult the gap has been closed that has been for 200 years between art and the public.""Ich kenne keinen deutschen Künstler, der seine Aufgabe dermaßen umfassend begreift, keinen, der die Witterung für das besitzt, was unsere Gegenwart umtreibt. Bei Schult ist die Kluft geschlossen, die seit fast zweihundert Jahren zwischen Kunst und Öffentlichkeit klafft." Jens Christian Jensen, "HA Schult – bleibt die Kunst auf der Strecke?" in HA Schult: Die Welt in der wir atmen, exh. cat., Kunsthalle Kiel, 1974, pp. 47-49. Reprinted as Jens Christian Jensen, "Kunst und Leben" in Eugen Thiemann, Christel Denecke, Dieter Treeck and Hans Rudolf Hartung (eds.), HA Schult der Macher (Cologne: Rheinland Verlag, 1978), p. 380.Ernst Wasmuth and Elke Grapenthin, HA Schult: Art is Action (Distributed Art Pub Incorporated, 2001). According to Peter Weibel, "For decades HA Schult has managed to stimulate public awareness using images he has experienced. He stages topics in public places, which are normally edged away from the public. His art work is always directly related to the location where it is shown. He confronts the feudalism, which is manifested in gigantic triumphant buildings with the pauperism of the exploited workers who built them. He pays tribute to the unnamed soldiers and slaves and not to the heroes and sovereigns.""Seit Jahrzehnten gelingt es HA Schult immer wieder, das öffentliche Bewusstsein durch gelebte Bilder zu beleben, indem er auf öffentlichen Plätzen Themen inszeniert, die genau diese Öffentlichkeit zu verdrängen beliebt. Stets stellen seine Arbeiten Beziehungen her zu dem Ort, an dem sie ausgestellt sind. Dem Feudalismus, dessen Macht in gigantischen Bauwerken triumphiert, stellt er den Pauperismus der Ausgebeuteten gegenüber, die die Bauwerke errichteten. Nicht den Namen der Helden und Herrscher, sondern den namenlosen Soldaten und Sklaven zollt er Tribut." Cited in Diözesanmuseum Paderborn: Die Zeit und der Müll: Trash-Kunst und Konsumkritik. Peter Weibel (Graz 2006), cited in HA Schult: Art is Life. According to art historian Gail Levin (Rutgers University), Schult "has made a biting commentary on the indulgent aspects of western society. He calls our attention to our own conspicuous consumption, obsessively returning to the metaphor of garbage, refuse dumps, and debris. He describes his picture boxes as expressing the 'archeology of everyday life'. Indeed, his concerns are with the excesses of western culture, the rhythms of life in a throwaway society." According to Mark Bradley and Kenneth Stow, "Schult's virtuous and political correct mission to convince the world that (...) 'we live in a time of garbage' and his argument that [his] 'social sculpture' operated as a 'mirror of ourselves' meant that his dirty exhibits-however 'out of place' they might seem-were thoroughly sanitized and legitimated, a powerful warning about what that world might become if it did not moderate its relationship with rubbish."Mark Bradley, ed., Rome, Pollution and Propriety: Dirt, Disease and Hygiene in the Eternal City from Antiquity to Modernity, Cambridge University Press, 2012, p. 1.
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