Dieter Roth: Selves. Retrospective at Aargauer Kunsthaus, Aarau / Switzerland

Dieter Roth (1930-1998) is considered as one of the great universal artists of the 20th century. Multi-talented, he worked in all kind of media: drawing, painting, sculpture, installation, photography, video. He was also a poet, musician and graphic designer. Dieter Roth published, collected, and designed furniture. The current retrospective at Aargauer Kunsthaus in Aarau / Switzerland is titled Selves (Selbste) and offers the rare occasion to have an extensive look at Dieter Roth’s numerous self portraits.

This video takes you through the exhibition during the opening night. The show starts with early drawings, paintings and sculptures. In his chocolate busts from the late 1960s he subjects his own image to decay. Also on display is an extensive group of works of his series Selbstbildnis als…, the assemblage Flüchtiges Kleiderbild, and works realized in collaboration with Arnulf Rainer. The exhibition concludes with the large-scale video installation Solo Szenen (1997-98), that spreads Dieter Roth’s everyday life on 128 TV monitors.

Dieter Roth was born in 1930 in Hannover / Germany. In the 1960s he took part in Happenings and Fluxus events. In collaboration with Daniel Spoerri and André Thomkins he created works of Eat-Art. He also realized works together with Richard Hamilton, with whom he shared a long-standing friendship. Dieter Roth participated in the 4th documenta in Kassel in 1968 and (posthumously) in the Documenta11 in 2002. He died in 1998 in Basel / Switzerland.

“Self-interrogation thus became a concern of overriding importance to Dieter Roth and the way in which he unrelentingly made his own self the focus of his work, while at the same time deconstructing it by all available means, is unique.” (exhibition text)

The exhibition runs until November 6, 2011 and will subsequently be on view at the Museum der Moderne in Salzburg.

Dieter Roth: Selves (Retrospective) at Aargauer Kunsthaus, Aarau / Switzerland. Opening reception, August 18, 2011.

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Photo set:
Dieter Roth: Selbste

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