This book brings together Bernhard Rüdiger's theoretical texts on the questions of language and form in contemporary art, seen from the perspective of the possibility of thinking them within the paradigm of shock or awe.
In 1945, Arturo Martini, profoundly affected by the upheavals of his era, published Scultura Lingua Morta (Sculpture as a Dead Language). In this seminal work, he mourned a language that had become silent, stripped of its pre-war references. Yet, even though its relationship with reality had transformed radically, the language of sculpture was far from dead. The history of the contemporary avant-garde, much like other progressive myths, often presents a linear narrative that downplays the impact of violent events on our worldview. In this book, Bernhard Rüdiger investigates major upheavals—such as the Chernobyl disaster in 1986 and the collapse of the World Trade Center in 2001—assessing their influence on artistic production and the evolution of its language and forms. To dissect these moments of shock and explore the profound shifts in our perceptual processes, writing as an artist Rüdiger draws on diverse theoretical objects from other eras, including Hiroshima Mon Amour by Alain Resnais, La Ricotta by
Pier Paolo Pasolini, and the machinist artworks of Francis Picabia. Every artist understands that language is not a static construct; it must be brushed against the grain to remain vital, as
Walter Benjamin noted about history. Language exists only in a radically contemporary dimension, circulating among the living as a tangible reality, indifferent to the references individuals might impose on it. The essence of contemporary art lies in its ability to grapple with this stubborn language, which, never transparent, lingers in the opacity of history.
Bernhard Rüdiger (born 1964 in Rome, lives and works in Paris since 1994) is an artist whose work on space, sound, and the physical and perceptual experiences of the body is fueled by a theoretical consideration of the reality of the artwork and its historical responsibility. He heads the Contemporary Art and Historical Temporalities research unit at the ENSBA Lyon.
