Short Answer Sunday: Hartmut Austen

Meant to elicit quick, intuitive responses, Short Answer Sunday will introduce readers to a wide variety of artists, educators, writers, curators, art enthusiasts and art adjacent individuals whose inclinations I admire. With the intent of getting to know the person behind the artwork as well generating new avenues to artistic discovery, participants may respond with only a few words or an artist’s name, always with the opportunity to elaborate if they wish!

Hartmut Austen is a longtime friend and an inspiring painter. I met Hartmut in 2008, while teaching at The College for Creative Studies in Detroit and we also spent many summers teaching together at The Interlochen Center for the Arts in Northern MI. He makes paintings that are smart, complex and playful, and, as an artist, seems to thrive on curiosity, discovery and invention. Hartmut’s painting are not beholden entirely to abstraction or representation, and their formal variety and color mischief results in some disorienting and poetic paintings that are absolutely my cup of tea. Often installed as a network, rather than lone entities, I find that Hartmut’s use of irregular sequencing provokes conversations between paintings, and develops connections between the aesthetic structures in the work and the architectural elements around them.

Hartmut’s questionnaire responses introduced me to a few artists and a great, new-to-me gallery and reminded me of some artists who I hadn’t looked at in a while.  For any interested parties, my weekly Short Answer Sunday prep involves a sort of immersion in each artist’s responses, their work via their website and previous exhibitions. It’s fun and recalls how I used to find new artists, books and music in the pre-algorithmic olden days.  Seven weeks in to this project, the data-head in me is loving the aggregate of all responses as much as each individual's answers. Also realizing that there are no obvious answers!! Anyways, digression complete! Hartmut has great, expansive taste in art and also music, and I know you'll love his smart, thoughtful answers for Short Answer Sunday.

For more on Hartmut Austen’s work, check out his website and find him on Instagram.
xo, Lauren

Name: Hartmut Austen
Occupation: Artist/Professor
Astrological data: Sagittarius
Hometown: Bielefeld in Europe, Metro Detroit in the US
Current location: Boston area

Other than Instagram, how do you find new-to-you artists?

By pulling out random books in the university library and by visiting exhibitions

 

An artwork that makes you laugh?

"Höhere Wesen Befahlen: rechte obere Ecke schwartz malen!", 1969, by Sigmar Polke

An artwork that makes you cry?

"Self-Portrait with Jewish Identity Card," c. 1943, by Felix Nussbaum (editor's note: Made me cry, too. More info on Nussbaum here)

 

Felix Nussbaum, Selbstporträt mit Judenpaß, c. 1943, oil on panel, 56 x 49 cm
Image Source

Most underrated artist?

Asger Jorn

An artwork that you'd like to live inside for a week?

Maybe in works by Joellyn Duesberry, unfuzzy, straight-forward landscape paintings of the American Southwest, as seen a bit more than a year ago at the Denver Art Museum.

An artist whose work you can't stop thinking about?

Johanna Billings

An artwork that feels like a warm hug?

A felt suit by Joseph Beuys

What's your favorite characteristic in an artwork?

That it engages me over a period of time

Erotic artwork? (editor's note: this is a multiple choice question)

 

Yes: ✅

What's an artwork that doesn't look like art?

The works in the exhibition "Travelling" by Felix Gonzales-Torres (Renaissance Society, 1994) confounded me so much that I had to make a painting about it.

What's an artwork that you suspect that you shouldn't like, but you do (guilty pleasure)?

Tagebuch der Amaryllis, 1981, by Horst Janssen

What's an artwork that you secretly hate?

I usually forget those things quickly.

Most insane art piece?

Can't really single out one. Perhaps drawings and performances by Paul McCarthy and Mike Kelley come to mind. Mind blowing, repulsive, in your face. Much needed.

Paul McCarthy, Painter, 1995, color video with sound
Duration: 50:01 min
Image Source

Fav monograph or art book?

"Drawings" by George Seurat, 1984, exhibition catalog published by Kunsthalle Bielefeld

Fav museum or gallery in your current location?

Anthony Greaney, a project space in Somerville, MA. In the 'About' section of its website it says: "Next to Market Basket and around the corner from Little India Market, off the alley."

Last exhibition you saw irl?

"Say It Loud: AAMARP, 1977 to Now" at the Institute of Contemporary Art in Boston

An artwork that packs a spiritual punch?

Isenheim Altar Piece (1512-16) by Matthias Grünewald

An artwork that you'd like to see before you die?

I'd rather be in a cabin and look at a bunch of mountains, or the sea. Not sure yet.

What art material do you love to nerd out on?

oils I guess

What was the last thing that you listened to in the studio?

Hüsker Dü, "Standing By the Sea"

What's a book that changed your life?

The Seurat Drawing exhibition catalog mentioned earlier

What song, book, podcast or film do you think everyone should know about?

Let me think.....

❤

Hartmut Austen studied painting and drawing with H.J. Diehl at Hochschule der Künste (University of the Arts) in Berlin. His first arrival in the United States was marked by a 1998 group exhibition titled "VOID" at Unfinished gallery in Williamsburg, New York. He has since exhibited widely in the United States and Germany, most recently at Good Weather Chicago. In 2009, Austen was awarded a Kresge Arts in Detroit Fellowship and was the Grant Wood Fellow for Painting and Drawing at the University or Iowa in 2012/13. He is an Associate Professor in Painting at Boston College. 

For more info about Harmut, check out his website and follow him on Instagram.