DER BANDWURM
“I AM A PROBLEM” exhibition
MMK - Museum für Moderne Kunst Frankfurt (Museum of Modern Art Frankfurt)
Frankfurt a.M., Germany, 2018
Selfie hype, veggie boom, plastic surgery, fitness mania – What’s our problem? In times of grotesque self-optimization and the ubiquitous pressure to achieve, the exhibition I AM A PROBLEM invites you on a journey through the ups and downs of human existence. Presented by theatre director and set designer Ersan Mondtag, MMK 2 becomes a sombre but nevertheless tantalizing parallel realm where works from the MMK collection become protagonists of a narrative and engage in dialogue.
For I AM A PROBLEM, Mondtag has transformed MMK 2 into a scenic parcours. On its serpentine paths, we encounter border crossers and doubles, quiet rebels, failed existences, and bodies fallen prey to the will to optimize. The works range from Andy Warhol’s Kellogg’s Cornflakes Box and a large-scale commissioned piece by Plastique Fantastique to some of the MMK’s most recent acquisitions, for example Will Benedict’s music video I AM A PROBLEM, from which the show takes its title.
Plastique Fantastique realised DER BANDWURM (the tapeworm) especially for this show. It references the legend according to which opera singer Maria Callas supposedly swallowed a tapeworm as a way of losing weight. In worm-lake manner, the shiny black sculpture winds its way through the exhibition space, offering views of works in its interior and ultimately opening up as if to consume the visitors as well.
Artist
Marco Canevacci and Yena Young (Plastique Fantastique)
Featured artists:
Kader Attia, Vanessa Beecroft, Will Benedict, Bernhard Johannes Blume, Shannon Bool, Miriam Cahn, John De Andrea, Marlene Dumas, Robert Gober, Douglas Gordon, Ilja Clemens Hendel, Georg Herold, Martin Honert, Jonathan Horowitz, On Kawara, Plastique Fantastique, Teresa Margolles, Barry Le Va, Bruce McLean, Aernout Mik, Lutz Mommartz, Bruce Nauman, Steven Parrino, Arnulf Rainer, Bettina Rheims, Thomas Ruff, Taryn Simon, Dayanita Singh, Markus Sixay, Jack Smith, Elaine Sturtevant, Jürgen Teller, Oliviero Toscani, Rosemarie Trockel, Andy Warhol
Special Thanks
Denis Schneg, Ingrid Pradler,
Photos
Marco Canevacci and Yena Young