Chardin Material

Description

Adapted from the lecture she delivered at the Institut fur Kunstkritik, Stadelschule in Frankfurt am Main, Ewa Lajer-Burcharth's essay explores the dimension of self-reflexivity in the work of eighteenth-century French painter, Jean-Simeon Chardin. Focusing on the material aspects of Chardin's practice, Lajer-Burcharth asks: In what ways were Chardin's painterly procedures "his own," and what were the implications of his possessive and personalized approach to the process of making? The author delves into these questions by examining a crucial moment in the artist's career, when he, for reasons we can only speculate about, temporarily abandoned his still life practice and turned to painting genre scenes. The essay is joined by responses from Daniel Birnbaum and Isabelle Graw, followed by the author's replies. Institut fur Kunstkritik Series

Daniel Birnbaum is a Swedish art critic, theoretician, and curator. He was the director of the Museum of Modern Art (Moderna Museet) in Stockholm from 2010 to 2018, and currently directs the VR company, Acute Art. Isabelle Graw (Frankfurt am Main/Berlin) is Professor of Art Theory and Art History at the Staatliche Hochschule fur bildende Kunste-Stadelschule, Frankfurt am Main. In 1990 Graw and Stefan Germer founded the quarterly magazine Texte zur Kunst. In 2003, Graw and Daniel Birnbaum founded the Institut fur Kunstkritik at the Stadelschule.