Jan Svenungsson

Kay Heymer's text from A Commissioned Readymade

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"9 Dates, With Supplemented Information Concerning Seeing and Reading"


1904, Paris
Constantin Brancusi had written his maxim on the wall of his studio in red pencil: Do not forget that you are an artist! Do not lose courage, be afraid of nothing and you will achieve your goal.

1914, Paris
Giorgio de Chirico painted the Portrait of Guillaume Apollinaire.

1924, Giverny
New eyeglasses were prescribed for the painter Claude Monet, which enabled him to paint a few more Nympheas.

1934, Paris
Whilst looking at a photograph of an African village Salvador Dali noticed a cubist style portrait created by turning the group of figures sitting in front of a hut on end. Dali produced a coloured version and called it Paranoiac Figure.

1944, Normandy
On 6 th June at the first light of dawn soldiers of the German Wehrmacht watched the approach of the Allied Army over the Channel through the embrasures in their bunkers.

1954, New York
Jasper Johns painted the American Flag and asked the question: "Is it a flag or is it a painting?"

1964, Düsseldorf
Joseph Beuys noticed a discrepancy in the proportions of the Berlin Wall and recommended that it be made 5 cm higher.

1974, Philadelphia
On 13 th March On Kawara painted a picture (Wednesday) and documented Nixon's Watergate with a cutting he had read in The Philadelphia Enquirer.

1984
To be completed.

Kay Heymer, Bonn, 17 th December 1991