''The Future of Art'' is a

2010 File:2010 Events Collage New.png, From top left, clockwise: The 2010 Chile earthquake was one of the strongest recorded in history; The Eruption of Eyjafjallajökull in Iceland disrupts air travel in Europe; A scene from the opening ceremony of ...

documentary film A documentary film or documentary is a non-fictional film, motion-picture intended to "document reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction, education or maintaining a Recorded history, historical record". Bill Nichols (film critic), Bil ...

by Erik Niedling and Ingo Niermann. It features interviews with protagonists of the

contemporary art Contemporary art is the art of today, produced in the second half of the 20th century or in the 21st century. Contemporary artists work in a globally influenced, culturally diverse, and technologically advancing world. Their art is a dynamic com ...

scene and premiered on 10 November 2010 in

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...

. The film was released on DVD in September 2011 accompanied by the book ''The Future of Art. A Manual'', published by Sternberg Press. Subsequent to the premiere screening, the movie was playing at the Angermuseum in

Erfurt Erfurt () is the capital and largest city in the Central German state of Thuringia. It is located in the wide valley of the Gera river (progression: ), in the southern part of the Thuringian Basin, north of the Thuringian Forest. It sits i ...

from 10 to 28 November 2010. Until May 2011 the interviews were also shown as a

web series A web series (also known as a web show) is a series of scripted or non-scripted online videos, generally in episodic form, released on the Internet, which first emerged in the late 1990s and became more prominent in the early 2000s. A single i ...

at ''3min.de'', a video-sharing site of

Deutsche Telekom Deutsche Telekom AG (; short form often just Telekom, DTAG or DT; stylised as ·T·) is a German telecommunications company that is headquartered in Bonn and is the largest telecommunications provider in Europe by revenue. Deutsche Telekom was ...

. The movie was mainly shot in Berlin,

Hamburg (male), (female) en, Hamburger(s), Hamburgian(s) , timezone1 = Central (CET) , utc_offset1 = +1 , timezone1_DST = Central (CEST) , utc_offset1_DST = +2 , postal ...

Frankfurt Frankfurt, officially Frankfurt am Main (; Hessian: , "Frank ford on the Main"), is the most populous city in the German state of Hesse. Its 791,000 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located on its na ...

and

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...

Structure

The documentary starts with a short prologue (Niermann taking a bath in the

Schlachtensee Schlachtensee () is a lake in the south west of Berlin, in the Steglitz-Zehlendorf borough (in the quarters of Schlachtensee), on the edge of the Grunewald forest. The lake lends its name to the surrounding area and to the nearby ''Studentend ...

lake in Berlin), followed by the actual interviews which are divided into four main chapters: :I. Investigation :II. Creation :III. Incubation :IV. Presentation In the interview series, the focus is on how the art business works and how an artist can be successful and create a lasting work of art. In the course of the film, Niermann develops the idea for an epochal work of art in an exemplary manner. Niermann then develops the concept of a pyramid. The pyramid would be peeled out of a mountain or hill several hundred meters high. The work would be financed by a collector who would then be buried inside the pyramid thus created. After the death of the collector, the demolished material must be piled up again. The pyramid is to disappear. The film ends at the Wachsenburg in

Thuringia Thuringia (; german: Thüringen ), officially the Free State of Thuringia ( ), is a state of central Germany, covering , the sixth smallest of the sixteen German states. It has a population of about 2.1 million. Erfurt is the capital and larg ...

. Niedling and Niermann present their idea to the lord of the castle. They ask how much a collector would have to pay to have the castle temporarily pulled down and then the pyramid peeled out of the mountain as planned. Featured artists, curators, collectors, and critics include (in order of appearance):All original screenshots taken from Wikimedia Commons, the producers released them under

CC BY-SA A Creative Commons (CC) license is one of several public copyright licenses that enable the free distribution of an otherwise copyrighted "work".A "work" is any creative material made by a person. A painting, a graphic, a book, a song/lyric ...

. Image:The Future of Art - Olafur Eliasson.jpg,

Olafur Eliasson Olafur Eliasson ( is, Ólafur Elíasson; born 5 February 1967) is an Icelandic–Danish artist known for sculptured and large-scale installation art employing elemental materials such as light, water, and air temperature to enhance the viewer's ...

Image:The Future of Art - Harald Falckenberg.jpg, Harald Falckenberg Image:The Future of Art - Antje Majewski.jpg, Antje Majewski Image:The Future of Art - Damien Hirst.jpg,

Damien Hirst Damien Steven Hirst (; né Brennan; born 7 June 1965) is an English artist, entrepreneur, and art collector. He is one of the Young British Artists (YBAs) who dominated the art scene in the UK during the 1990s. He is reportedly the United Kingd ...

Image:The Future of Art - Gregor Jansen.jpg, Gregor Jansen Image:The Future of Art - Hans-Ulrich Obrist.jpg,

Hans-Ulrich Obrist Hans Ulrich Obrist (born 1968) is a Swiss art curator, critic, and historian of art. He is artistic director at the Serpentine Galleries, London. Obrist is the author of ''The Interview Project'', an extensive ongoing project of interviews. He is ...

Image:The Future of Art - Marina Abramović.jpg,

Marina Abramović Marina Abramović ( sr-Cyrl, Марина Абрамовић, ; born November 30, 1946) is a Serbian conceptual and performance artist. Her work explores body art, endurance art, feminist art, the relationship between the performer and audienc ...

Image:The Future of Art - Olaf Breuning.jpg,

Olaf Breuning Olaf Breuning (born February 16, 1970)SIK ISEAOlaf Breuning/ref> is a Swiss-born artist, born in Schaffhausen, who lives in New York City. Works *''Home 1/Home 2'' (2004/7)--30 minute video starring Brian Kerstetter. ''Home 1'' is presented as ...

Image:The Future of Art - Terence Koh.jpg,

Terence Koh Terence Koh (born 1977 in Beijing, China ) is a Canadian artist who has also worked under the alias "asianpunkboy". The artist's work spans a range of media, including drawing, sculpture, video, performance, and the internet. Originally workin ...

Image:The Future of Art - Genesis P-Orridge.jpg,

Genesis Breyer P-Orridge Genesis may refer to: Bible * Book of Genesis, the first book of the biblical scriptures of both Judaism and Christianity, describing the creation of the Earth and of mankind * Genesis creation narrative, the first several chapters of the Book of ...

Image:The Future of Art - Boris Groys.jpg,

Boris Groys Boris Efimovich Groys (born 19 March 1947) is an art critic, media theorist, and philosopher. He is currently a global distinguished professor of Russian and Slavic studies at New York University and senior research fellow at the Karlsruhe Univer ...

Image:The Future of Art - Tobias Rehberger.jpg, Tobias Rehberger Image:The Future of Art - Thomas Bayrle.jpg, Thomas Bayrle

References

External links

*
Review
by ''Monopol'' magazine, November 10, 2010 (in German)
Review
by ''art'' magazine, November 12, 2010 (in German)
Interview with the producers
''The Tait Global'', November 23, 2011 {{DEFAULTSORT:Future of Art 2010 films German documentary films 2010s German-language films Documentary films about visual artists 2010s English-language films 2010s German films