Schauspieler II, 13

Genzken’s series of Schauspieler (Actors) use commercially made mannequins, dressed by the artist in a range of eclectic materials and clothing, some even drawn from Genzken’s own wardrobe, in a gesture reminiscent of the use of mannequins by artists in the 1938 International Surrealist Exhibition in Paris. Early figures from the series, which began in 2012, were often grouped, dramatically arrayed and brightly festooned with taped-on and haphazardly draped accessories and garments, referencing both the consumerist excesses and cognitive delirium of capitalism. By contrast, the mannequins of Schauspieler II, appear more self-contained and brooding, occupying a condition described by art historian Lisa Lee as "introversion" marked by "motifs of buffering and binding."[1] Thus, the child-like mannequin in Schauspieler II, 13 stands lithely, even as every other element registers precarity and danger—from the gag-like binding and trussed-up torso to the warning label that peeks through the clothing. Actors as they are, proxies of a sort, Genzken’s Schauspieler traffic in the ambivalence toward the reality of lived experience, hinting at the fictions of birth (here in the printed detail from Michelangelo’s Creation of Adam) and of death (in the taxidermized animals at the figure’s feet). Our voyeuristic encounter with the figure is tempered by the unavoidability of self-implication through the mirror foil and mirror base, and even the reflections in the figure’s glasses.


[1] Lisa Lee. Isa Genzken: Sculpture as World Receiver. University of Chicago Press, 2017, p. 135. Lee also notes the predominance of protective gear in the series as it connects to buffering, or the lessening of impact.