Informationen / Biografie über otto schlafmann

Creative work
Like many others Otto Schlafmann started as a classical artist but according to his own opinion his pictures turned out to be uninteresting and unworthy of attention. Later he used the rest of the pictures in “The Past is on Fire” performance (Vergangenheit in Brand). Justifying the title, he burned the old pictures in front of the audience, and the last pictures literally added oil to the fire.
This stage of his creative life was marked by both ideological and physical destruction. “An artist won’t be able to do something completely new until he sees his old works in fire” he said in one of the interviews.
His performance “Together” or Zusammen! Dedicated to the fall of the Berlin Wall and the reunion of Germany in 1990 became widely known. In his studio Otto reconstructed a fragment of the Wall and allowed his audience to destroy it with their own hands.
Suggestive art is an avant-garde movement based on direct transference of emotions by entrancing the viewer without using any images. This can be achieved only by the right combination of many factors. The premises housing the exhibition must be comfortable and dimly lit, with only the pictures in the spotlight. Otto gives a short lecture on his artistic trend and provides the audience with some important guidelines.
The foundation of this method is made up not so much of the picture as of the viewer themselves. Therefore the subject of the art becomes its object, that is it virtually looks at its own reflection in the mirror.
Otto divided his exhibitions into several steps for better understanding and preparation of the audience.
1st step – the pictures characterized by a single image or sensation (warm/cold, loud/quiet).
2nd step – the pictures conveying one emotion (fear, anger, love).
3d step – pictures with mixed emotions and feelings.
Otto Schlafmann’s works in private and museum collections:
• National Centre for Contemporary Art, Moscow
• MUKHA Museum of Contemporary Art, Antwerpen, Belgium
• Kolodzei Art Foundation, Highland Park, New Jersey, USA
• P. Pakesch, I. Dittrich, Viena, Austria
• T. Weser, Munich, Germany
• J.F. Bisot, Paris, France
• Museum of Contemporary Art. France
• Majdanek State Museum. Lublin, Poland
• Schloss-Museum Penkun. Germany
• Museum Malchin. Germany
• Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao. Bilbao, Spain
Personal exhibitions
• 1980 Kunsthalle Düsseldorf, Germany. «Was sind Sie denn von Beruf?»
• 1995 Galerie Max Hetzler, Berlin, Germany
• 1984 Kunstverein Münster, Germany «Der Ort des Bogens»
• 1989 Galerie Komat, Braunschweig, Germany
• 1990 Galerie Fischer, Hamburg, Germany
• 1996 On New York, Wooster Gardens, New York, USA
• 1997 Digitalin, Galerie Gebr. Lehmann, Dresden
• 2000 Barbara Flynn Gallery, Sidney, Australia