Karl Otto Götz

(ISBN-10: 3925782834 / ISBN-13: 978-3925782831)
This 120-page, hardcover and bilingual (German and English) catalogue accompanied an exhibition of K.O. Götz's work that ran at Die Galerie, Frankfurt am Main, from 11 September to 8 November, 2014. 

The texts were contributed by the artist Prof. Rissa (a.k.a. Karin Götz, maiden name Martin, the wife of K.O. Götz), Els Ottenhof (the director of the CoBrA Museum in Amstelveen), the German concrete poet Franz Mon, and the curator and author Ina Ströher. The translations were supplied by moi.

To quote Wikipedia (accessed 26/11/15): "Karl Otto Götz (born 22 February 1914), often simply called K.O. Götz, is a German artist, film maker, draughtsman, printmaker, writer and professor of art at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf. He is one of the oldest living and active artists who are older than 100 years of age and is known for his explosive and complex abstract forms. His powerful, surrealist-inspired works have earned him international recognition in exhibitions like documenta II in 1959. Götz has never confined himself to one specific style or artistic field. He also explored generated abstract forms through television art.  Götz is one of the most important members of the German Art Informel movement. His works and teachings influenced future artists such as Sigmar Polke, Nam June Paik and Gerhard Richter. Currently, he is living and working in Wolfenacker in the Westerwald."

Of special note (at least to me): He was the first German member of the CoBrA art group, which, in turn, was perhaps one of the first pan-European art groups.

K.O. Goetz, "Giverny V", 1988, 200cm x 260cm

(From Die Galerie's website)

The Importance of Grammar, Part II

The Beethoven Files / Die Akte Beethoven (2013)

In 2012, I translated was the original treatment for The Beethoven Files, another instalment of the TV series The Culture Files, which focuses on important cultural figures of the past. (See: The Kleist File.) Written by Hedwig Schmutte, this 52-minute episode was directed by Hedwig Schmutte and Ralf Pleger, and features Lars Eidinger (of Hell [2011 / trailer]) as Beethoven and Pheline Roggan as Josephine Brunsvik. The Gebrueder Beetz production was funded by the Mitteldeutsche Medienförderung and MEDIA and Film- und Medien Stiftung NRW, in co-operation with Beethoven-Haus Bonn.

Trailer:

To take the explanation of the episode as found on the Gebrueder Beetz's website: "Ludwig van Beethoven's work is legendary – and already was while he was still alive. He is famous around the world, and yet little is known about the conditions under which his music was composed. One thing is certain: he composed most of his masterpieces AFTER the onset of his deafness. When he composed his famous 9th symphony, he wasn't able to hear a thing! A deaf composer? How is that possible? 200 years after Beethoven's death, The Beethoven File casts light of one of the biggest mysteries of music history."

Igor Mitoraj – Skulpturen / Sculptures

 

(ISBN-10: 3925782729 / ISBN-13: 978-3925782725)

An 80-page hardcover catalog published in conjunction with his exhibition (6 June – 2 September 2012) at Die Galerie, Frankfurt am Main, and the public display of his work on the grounds in front of the Poelzig Bau (formerly known as the IG Farben Building), otherwise known as Campus Westend of the Goethe-Universität Frankfurt. German texts by Cécile Schortmann and Elke Mohr, English-language translation by moi.

The Polish sculptor Igor Mitoraj (26 March 1944 – 6 October 2014) was born in Oederan, Germany, to a Polish mother and a French father. He studied at the Cracow Kunsthochschule (Art School) and at the Cracow Kunstakademie (Art Academy) and, later, the National School of Fine Arts in Paris. As of 1974, his artistic focus turned to sculpture.

As The Guardian explains in their obituary of the artist: "Igor Mitoraj, who has died aged 70, was a monumental sculptor who kept his brand of classicism in fashion by combining technical ability with a certain postmodern malaise. His fractured anatomies and immense bandaged heads [...] were both accessible and enigmatic. Rupture and fragmentation became metaphors for the passing of antiquity, but could also stand for the nature of time itself, and indeed the whole human condition. A viewer of these broken forms might recall Shelley's lines: 'My name is Ozymandias, king of kings: Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!' The sculptures also look fabulous."

Photo by esc (found online).

Babai / Father (Germany, 2015)

Drama, 104 min., written & directed by Visar Morina for Niko Films.

Under its working title of My Father, I translated a variety of synopses and treatments as well as the screenplay of this feature-length movie for Alias Film& Sprachtransfer.

The plot to the movie, as supplied on the Niko Films website: "Ten-year old Nori (Val Maloku) and his father Gesim (Astrit Kabashi) earn their living by selling cigarettes in pre-war Kosovo of the nineties. Gesim will hear nothing of Nori's mother. He is an expert at escaping the past and now he wants to flee Kosovo, without Nori. But the boy tries everything in his means to prevent his dad from leaving. An accident results. The shocked father takes Nori to the hospital. When Nori gets out, his father is simply gone. Angry, yet determined, Nori sets out on a perilous journey to find his father and indeed finds him in Germany. With the persistence only a child can have, he confronts his father and cannot forgive him for desertion." 

Babai is proving to be a film festival favorite and is raking in the nomination and awards.

Trailer:

The Artists Labels of Fattoria Nittardi / Die Künstleretiketten von Nittardi

Nittardi is a family winery situated in the heart of the Chianti Classico region of Italy. The earliest known reference to the property, which is located on the boundary between the provinces of Siena and Florence, is a document from 1183 that refers to a defensive tower known a "Nectar Dei". By the 16^th century, the expansive property belonged to the great Renaissance artist Michelangelo. Over the centuries the property changed hands often until, in the early 80s, it was taken over by the Frankfurt publisher and art gallerist Peter Femfert and his wife Stefania Canali, a historian from Venice. They restored Nittardi with love and care, and replanted the vineyards. Their son, Léon Femfert, has been involved full time at the winery since early 2013.

In honor of the artistic history of the winery, every year since 1981 a well-known artist has supplied the artwork for the label as well as the wrapping paper used for the Casanuova di Nittardi Vigna Doghessa wine bottles. The list of participating, internationally renowned artists includes, among others:  Hundertwasser, Corneille, A.R. Penck, Mitoraj, Yoko Ono, Horst Janssen, Valerio Adami, Eduardo Arroyo, Elvira Bach, Robert Combas and Mimmo Paladino.

To the thirtieth anniversary of the wine label tradition, Nittardi published this book featuring the complete collection of the by then 30 different artist labels and corresponding wrapping papers. The texts were supplied by the respected wine experts Jeannie Cho Lee MW and Thomas Schröder, and I did the translations.

The book, as well a broad selection of the fine Nittardi products, can be obtained at select fine shops or online at Stefania Canali.

Head Cold / Schnupfen im Kopf

A Film by Gamma Bak, Germany 2010, Running Time: 92 min. In German, English and Hungarian.
Head Cold was the first of Gamma Bak's film projects that I ever worked on. I translated a variety of subtitles and text cards, the press release, and diverse informational texts. I'm not really sure how Gamma Bak came to use my services, but since then she's pulled me in on a number of projects in which she was involved, including her recent documentary Engelbecken, and the J. Jackie Baier documentaries House of Shame: Chantal All Night Long (2011) and Julia (2013).

German Trailer:

Over at imdb, hudsonwa of New York, New York, has a good synopsis/review of the feature-length documentary:

"A plain-spoken and honest answer to the question, 'What is it like to be psychotic'? To start, there is the great loneliness of serious illness. The title refers to a comment by Gamma Bak's partner at the time, during her first crisis: 'This is all like a head cold, it will pass.'
"Gamma Bak had her first psychosis in 1995, when she was thirty years old, working as a film director and producer in Berlin. Bak was supposed to be part of the free generation – a Jew from Hungary, who never knew totalitarianism, living a free and easy life in an open society. What she got instead was an adult life punctuated by seven episodes of schizoid-affective psychosis, in and out of psychiatric institutions, treated by a total of fourteen doctors and six psychologists, and prescribed twenty-four different anti-psychotic drugs over fourteen years.
"Bak tells her story through a series of interviews – with friends, ex-partners, colleagues, relatives, a fellow patient, and with herself – and clips from previous films, including East… West… Home's Best (1992) and Eine Frau und ihr Kontrabass (A Woman and Her Contrabass, 1994).
"There's no trace of exhibitionism in Bak's relentless gaze, and no voyeurism in this documentary. Instead, the film grapples openly with questions of responsibility for one's own life, and the necessity of walking through what cannot be overcome."

English Trailer: