ANSELM KIEFER - CAFA Museum, Beijing, China

On Friday Dec. 16, 2016 i visited the exhibition Anselm Kiefer in China, which opened on Nov. 19, 2016 at the CAFA Museum in Beijing.

I must say it did not leave a good impression but rather an unnerving feeling which could only echo the fog of heavy pollution that settled over Beijing that same day.

I am not a fan of Kiefer's work; I rather dislike any kind of art that is based solely on a precise lapse of dark time. Kiefer's goal is to force the public to remember his country's dark history but how can we still define Germany's history to the Nazism - Yes it was the darkest hour of humanity and the atrocities can never be allowed to happen again but isn't hope and healing the way to bring our world forward? I honestly believe that art as not only witness but a healing process and the overuse by artist of the world war II has been long overplayed especially by an artist born 2 months before the end of the war which is too young to even been marked by it.

Instead would it be more positive to express the lessons we learned from that history and especially in today's global environment - rather than contemplating the past we should study the present and learn about the future.

I must take a moment to aboard another topic in regards of this exhibition and this time in defense of the artist as well as all artists which should be protected at any cost from the logistic and thinking’s of the art world surrounding them.

When an artist is opposed to his own exhibition, he must be heard however unjust it might seems; In the case of Anselm Kiefer exhibit at the CAFA Museum, the major issue rest with the German organizers (Bell Art Centre, Hamburg & Ludwig Museum, Koblenz) who failed to properly communicate with the artist thus damaging the exhibition even so the artist has signed an agreement. It would be understandable that the CAFA Museum would still move forward with the exhibit and it has legal rights to do so as the artist signed an agreement but ethically this is a blowing mistake. Lets not the status of "Being the first to exhibit Anselm Kiefer in China" damage an institution and its relation to an artist.

Artists must be protected at all time because the creation comes from them, the ideas and symbols that depicts our societies and which is an integral part of our culture, helping to understand the evolution of the Human species.

Artists are at the center and without them there is nothing - no museums, no galleries, foundations, art fairs, auction houses, collector and so on - these are all tools to disperse art but in no way to create it - there are useful but not essentials.

Alban RAYSSE