Wiesbaden (dpa/lhe) – If the Kassel art exhibition documenta is advised externally, then, according to Hesse’s Minister of Art Angela Dorn (Greens), this is not an encroachment on artistic freedom. With a view to a recently published expert report, she said on Thursday in the state parliament in Wiesbaden that an advisory board could mediate. “The documenta needs external advice and internal conflict mechanisms in order to be able to work without political and state intervention in artistic freedom,” she explained. “Knowledge that classifies, knowledge that helps to understand: That doesn’t contradict artistic freedom. It complements and supports it.”
The documenta shareholders, the city of Kassel and the state of Hesse set up the expert committee to deal with the anti-Semitism scandal at documenta fifteen. Among other things, the experts came to the conclusion that there was a lack of clear responsibility structures and conflict management procedures.
According to von Dorn, the final report is an important basis for the reorganization of the documenta. “The shareholders have already decided in the supervisory board that the recommendations will be incorporated as a basis for an organizational study they have initiated,” she explained. “I want the documenta to have a strong future as the world’s most important exhibition for contemporary art in Kassel.”
If the structural reform of the documenta succeeds, this could serve as a model for the cultural sector, explained the minister. “Because the area of ??tension between artistic freedom and discrimination affects many cultural institutions. Combating anti-Semitism – also in culture – is a task that we all face.”
