Video Works

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1970, Super 8mm scratch film, b/w, silent, 2 min

A car ride from its merry start to the abrupt end, scratched into black film material.
Awards Arbeitsgemeinschaft Deutscher Jugendfilmclubs, Aachen, 1972; Photokina-Obelisk, Cologne, 1972; Deutscher Jugendfilmpreis, 1972; ADAC-Art Collection, München

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1975, video, colour, sound, 8 min
Royal College of Art, London

As the Old Testament tells, God communicated with His people via the ark of the covenant. A good reception was ensured by regular tests of the communication channel. This video shows some test pictures.

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1976, video, colour, sound, 6 min 30 sec
Royal College of Art, London

Like a movie trailer, this video sums up Faust’s quest »for the inmost force that binds the world and guides its course« (Goethe). Appearing as the green man of the traffic light he encounters all conceivable challenges before disappearing into his own star constellation.
Music: Robin Quirk

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1978, video, colour, sound, 5 min
Brooklyn Museum Art School, New York

What is the difference between science and mythology? The artist posing as a scientist seems to know. Based on visual evidence he explains the »doubling phenomenon«.
First broadcast on Manhattan Cable TV, May 1978; Collection Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen, Stuttgart

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1981, video, colour, sound, 4 min 30 sec
Museum Folkwang, Essen

Animated books, video books and flying books – a look into the future of books from 1981.

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1982–1985, video, colour, stereo sound, Part 1: 30 min, Part 2: 19 min; Original version in German »Alles bestens – Videolieder«, versions in English, and in French »Tout est très bien – chansons vidéo«

»These colourful little songs ring a joyfulness that is so obviously exaggerated that they reveal themselves as a satirical comment on an optimistic attitude and a naive belief in progress that developed in the post-war Germany of the fifties. Deep down the listener senses that this carefree attitude is not justified by the grimness of reality, neither in the past and certainly not today. However he isn’t quite sure how seriously he has to take this musical trap: He suddenly finds himself torn between yearning for such a simple and harmonious world and rejecting it on the grounds of rational criticism.
After all, there is a psychologically powerful root to those truisms and cliches. The plagued listener would gladly share this optimistic outlook, as he could certainly use it as a source of energy in his struggle to overcome depressing phenomena like information overload and communications dry-up in a modern world controlled by mass media, an endangered environment, everyday chores, the mechanization and complication of vast areas of human interaction and its subsequent reduction to formulas...« (Introductory text)

Part 1 1982/83
Introduction (2'20") • Do it yourself (1'5") • Snap Shot (1'40") • Telephone (1' 20") • Washing Machine (1'10") • Oh, Tannenbaum (2'30") • New York (2') • Black Forest (1' 30") • Driving (1') • Klassefrau (1' 10") • Disco (1') • In Space (2') • Art Education (2'10") • Modern Life (1' 40") • At the Beach (1'30") • Time (2'20") • TV (1")

Part 2 1984/85
Everytime/Everywhere (1'45") • Electrician (1'20") • Painting (1'25") • Politics (1'30") • Paris (2') • In Bed (1'30") • Stereo (1') • The Toilet of Venus (2') • Video (1'30") • Work (1'45")

Produced with support from Musikakademie Basel; Studio Garreis, Offenburg; Experimentalstudio der Heinrich-Strobel-Stiftung des SWF, Freiburg; Fa. Bosch Fernsehanlagen, Darmstadt; Alexander-Clavel-Stiftung, Basel;
Awards: French Ministry of Culture, 2ème Manifestation Internationale de Vidéo, Montbéliard / France 1984; 1st Videonale Bonn, 1984; 1. Marler Videokunst-Preis 1984; TV-Art Jury Recommendation Award, Video Culture Canada, Toronto, 1984; Most Popular Music Video Award, Video Culture Canada, Toronto, 1984; included in 14 collections in Germany and abroad

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1986, video, colour, sound, 5 min; German version »Video im Wandel«, French version »Histoires de la Vidéo«

The host presents the early history of television, with traces leading to the old Egyptian and Roman cultures as well as to medieval Germany.
Awards: Marl Video Art Award selection 1988; Selection Deutscher Videokunst-Preis ’92 – the 50 best; Collection of ZKM, Karlsruhe

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1988, video, colour, sound, 16 min 20 sec

»German Pictures« is one of several videos for the Art Disco, Germany’s official cultural contribution to the Seoul Olympics. Dream-like sequences from fairy tales as well as everyday life show different protagonists and locations in South Germany.
Music: Martin Brack
Produced by Goethe Institut Munich for German Art Disco Seoul, Korea (German culture contribution for the 1988 Olympics); ZDF Production Award at 3rd Videonale Bonn, 1988

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1989, video, colour, sound, 4 min 45 sec,
commissioned by Akademie Schloss Solitude, Stuttgart

Based on a newly interpreted German folk song this video looks at the construction site of a residency for scholarship recipients.

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1989, video, colour, sound, 39 min

Found, staged or digitally generated scenes from mythology and daily life question the relation between reality and cliché in the media age. Torn between emotional desire and critical distance, Faust searches for the »lovely moment« that may doom his soul. Evocative fragments of narration are set in various locations in the tri-state-area of Germany, France and Switzerland: the Birsfelden hydro power plant, the Roman villa at Kaiseraugst, a medieval castle in the Vosges mountains or the Black Forest bunker for the German cultural heritage on micro film are some of the special places where princes, angels, joggers, nymphs, dwarfs, tango dancers, Helena and the aging Faust are meeting for a casual rendez-vous. The sound track mixes folk songs, dance beats, voice art and text elements in German, in French and in the local Alemannic dialect.
Supported by Kulturreferat des Regierungspräsidiums Freiburg; Kulturstiftung der Regio Basiliensis; Kulturamt der Stadt Freiburg; Universität Freiburg / Institut für Informatik; Polygon Creative Computeranimation, Ludwigsburg; Ecole des Beaux-Arts, Mulhouse; Agence Culturelle Technique d’Alsace; Collection Museum Fukuyama, Japan and Goethe Institut, München

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1990, video, colour, sound, 24 min

A portrait of the painter Herbert Wentscher sen. for his 90th birthday.
Archive City of Schopfheim

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1997, video, colour, sound, 3 min

A tribute to the poet Johann Wolfgang von Goethe in Weimar.
Collection Museum im Markgrafenschloss, Emmendingen

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1981 / 2005, video, colour, silent, 20 min

A tribute to the legendary Black Forest pine tree.

Video material generated in 1981 with an analogue video synthesizer was remixed digitally in 2005 in collaboration with Lars Patzelt for a public projection in Freiburg’s old part of town.
With support from Heinrich-Strobel-Foundation of SWF radio and tv, Freiburg (1981) and artforum3 e.V. (2005)

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2005, video, colour, sound, 4 min

While the smoke of incense sticks is drifting by, we hear a rhyming report on the difficulties of meditating.

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2006, video, colour, sound, 3 min

While the body stays fit with the help of gym clubs, spiritual fitness deserves equally adequate training. This video shows the example of a digitally visualized personal training program for the perfection of supersensory capacities.
Animation: Sebastian Dinter, Sound: Johannes Harth

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2007, video, colour, sound, 1 min 30 sec

At Mummelsee, a wondrous lake up in the Black Forest mountains, words appear on the water and in the woods, inviting the wanderer to examine the self.
Animation: Guillaum Beinat

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2009, video, colour, sound, 3 min; German version »Das Yoga der Kunst«, 2 min 30 sec

»...Yoga art is structured the way that – without negating intellectual or emotional potentials – it sees the heart as source and goal, as the carrier medium for the vibrations transmitted by the art piece...«
Animation: Robert Rauchfuss, Blue-Box-Studio: Azim Akcivan

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2015, video loop, colour, silent; German version: »Kunstpraxis für ästhetische Energiearbeit«

Everything is energy!
Animation: Frederic Brückner