Christian Boltanski - The Early Works
Firstly however it would seem that we need to talk about Boltanski’s early work. Lynn Gumpert almost dismisses Boltanski’s paintings in her description of his early work in a need to get to the more experimental, and better documented, work which he was to embark upon following his first solo exhibition in 1968.
His exhibition at the age of twenty-four, La Vie impossible de Christian Boltanski (The impossible life of Christian Boltanski) was displayed in a cinema and included a twelve minute film (of the same title) of actors and crude dolls interacting within a surreal setting. The film was shown in a small "room-like structure" (Gumpert, 1994, p. 18) that could seat six or seven people amongst some of the dolls. Some if his paintings from the previous year were hung on the balcony above.
It is claimed in Lynn Gumpert’s book on Boltanski that this exhibition coincided with the événements de mai, the student demonstrations that took place in Paris, Berlin, Rome and Turin. It is the influence that this "system-wide cultural transformation" is said to have had on artists that is of interest when discussing Boltanski. Gumpert quotes Germano Celant [from "The Italian Complexity," in The Knot: Arte Povera at P.S. 1 exhibition catalogue] as a demonstration that many artists "quit painting and embarked on an extended inquiry into the meaning and purpose of art." (Gumpert, 1994, p.19) It is quite reasonable given the experimental nature of Boltanski’s work to suggest that while he had been producing pieces of work that questioned the meaning and purpose of art pre-événements de mai, that the demonstrations left France with an art-scene that allowed such work to have continued if not greater support from both galleries and artists.
From 1969 onwards Boltanski started work on exceptionally repetitive tasks for example a piece titled Work in progress required his burying and unearthing nearly a thousand pink sticks at the American Centre. This was followed in 1971 by his rolling dirt into small balls, producing nearly three thousand of them. The repetitive work continued with the sculpting of 900 plus sugar cubes into non-identical abstract forms. It is said of this ephemeral work that it was produced in an attempt to caricature "artists who attempt to cheat death through their works." (Gumpert, 1994, p.22)
Boltanski at this time talked of this work in terms of "what seems marvellous to me is the striving - hoping to succeed in full knowledge that you are not going to succeed, because you hope to succeed anyway". (Boltanski in Gumpert, 1994, pg. 22)
It is exceptionally difficult to glean a clear picture of Boltanski’s work at this time in his career as so many diverse and separate projects were being made at the same time. It would appear that his paintings, films and the obsessive/repetitive work were all being produced at the same time.
Take as an example 1970, which Gumpert writes about thus, "In 1970, Boltanski began to fabricate hundreds of small knives and booby traps... Around this time Boltanski also began to make artist’s books..." Yet Gumpert goes on to say that Boltanski’s first book, Recherché et présentation de tout ce qui reste de mon enface, 1944-50. (Research and presentation of everything that remains from my childhood, 1944-50) was produced in 1969. Gumpert’s conflicting statements may be due different reported versions of the facts. So yet again we seem to come up against the ambiguous side of Boltanski’s past with no clear way of knowing how his works followed on one from another. Whether this is due to a conscious decision on the part of the artist (like his constant re-working of his childhood e.g. Recherche et présentation…), poor documentation of works at this relatively early stage in his career or just highly varied work patterns, it would appear impossible to tell.
In the period around 1969 Boltanski started to produce books that dealt with his childhood. His first book Recherché et présentation … was a nine page book presenting apparently detailing all that remained of his childhood from 1944-50. It contained snapshots from family outings, a class portrait, a page from an essay, a photograph of his childhood bed and a shirt that he had worn. The book was reproduced using a cheap photocopier that a gallery owner had made available to artists and as a consequence the photographs were devoid of tonal ranges. Something that we see repeated in Boltanski’s later works almost as though it was a theme.
This was the first in a series of supposedly autobiographical books produced by Boltanski, although it has been shown that it was not created using his own photographs and materials but those of his nephew (Gumpert, 1994, p.24). This was followed by an even more overtly fabricated piece, detailing future events that would lead to his demise. Again the use of photography and the fantastical subject matter in this work would make it quite plain to the audience that photographs (especially where Boltanski was concerned) were not the hitherto reliable witnesses that they had been.
An important piece of work from this period that is worth noting is the Album de photos de la famille D. 1939-1964 as this would be a style in which he would work and develop in later pieces: the use of numerous appropriated photographs re-photographed and presented en masse as a collective body of work. This style would appear to be one which he settled on as an appropriate style for this type of subject matter. Other works of the period e.g. Les 62 membres du Club Mickey en 1955 and Portraits des élèves du CES des Lentillères also used this mass of re-photographed images as their basis.
A later piece of work that is worth mentioning is Images d’une année de faits divers (Images from a year of news items) due to its continuing use of appropriated images but also for its development of Boltanski’s questioning of the perception of truth. Boltanski appropriated and used images from a weekly tabloid (Détective, predominantly concerned with "grisly tragedies" (Gumpert, 1994, p.38)) to create this piece. By separating the photographs from their contexts Boltanski was able to demonstrate the anonymity that is inherently part of appropriated images. It was however produced using source material that would leave the viewer slightly troubled, as it was impossible to separate the perpetrators from the innocents.
In fact it is very difficult to leave much of Boltanski’s early work out of a précis of his background as so much can be seen to influence or inform his later works. As Boltanski uses objects they are more easily read as stylistic influences in his later works than a brush stroke might be for another artist. A painter may find that a particular type of brushwork will suit the subject matter in an early piece of work, it will form part of his visual repertoire or library and can be recalled for use at a later date. In the same way that Boltanski will reuse aspects of his early work in later pieces. Simply put every piece of artwork produced by a serious artist is a learning experience and will inform subsequent works.
Boltanski would appear to continually draw on previous works’ lessons to inform his later work. In fact some later pieces of work even go so far as to actually include earlier ones e.g. the Vitrines des référence.
In his interview with Melvyn Bragg, Boltanski admits that he feels that artists have only one idea which they continually re-work. They were discussing Boltanski’s subject matter (death) but it could equally apply to Boltanski’s working methods.
Even if Boltanski’s working methods are varied, ranging from the carving of sugar cubes through mail art to photography, they all contain the element of reproduction. From the hundreds of dirt balls, pink sticks, the mail art to his photography all are, or use the, multiple for their effect. Being "nourished on the very formal, Minimal work of the 1970s" (Boltanski cited in Gumpert 1990, pg. 29) this would seem to strike some form of balance between the clean simplicity of minimalism and the varied nature of mass reproduction.