Commissioning artists’ brands: the case of the Deutsche Guggenheim

ABSTRACT

This article examines the role of contemporary art commissioning as a tactic for both collecting and image building on the part of contemporary art institutions. Central to this practice is the selection of artists’ brands, namely the commissioning of works by pre-eminent artists for symbolic and economic purposes. Through the lens of the Deutsche Guggenheim commission series (1997–2013), the article explores the notion of artists' brands as a new aspect of contemporary canon formation. The analysis shows how preferred traits and styles of such brands are utilised to foster or improve the image of the commissioning institution. In addition, the article argues that the selection and collection of contemporary art through commissioning is often directly linked to the business interests of the commissioner and can serve the purpose of reputation laundering on the part of private art institutions and corporate art collections.

KEYWORDS:

• Art commissioning
• artists' brands
• canon formation
• corporate art collecting
• Deutsche Bank
• Deutsche Guggenheim

Acknowledgements

This article is based, in part, on the second chapter of the author's PhD thesis Commissioning the Contemporary: Museum Brands, Art Trends and Creative Networks, Loughborough University, 2020.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes on contributor

Franziska Wilmsen is currently completing a PhD at Loughborough University (England) on the topic of contemporary art commissioning in European and British museums. This research builds upon Wilmsen’s previous career as a curatorial assistant at the Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg (Germany), and her Masters’ research at the Ruhr University, Bochum. She has presented at conferences at the University of Oxford and the Institut national d’histoire de l’art, Université Paris 8 and at the Tate Research Symposium. From October 2020, she will conduct research on the topic of private power and inequality in art institutions for a joint research project between Loughborough University and the Université Paris 8.

Notes

1 For the purposes of this discussion, I follow the general definition of the term ‘brand’ proposed by the American Marketing Association. See ‘Definitions of Marketing’. American Marketing Association website. https://www.ama.org/the-definition-of-marketing-what-is-marketing/ (Accessed 11 August 2020).

2 This refers to Warhol’s credo ‘art is business’ under which he and his co-workers performed in the Factory.

3 Noteworthy exhibitions are, for example, Eliasson’s The Weather Project (2003) for the Tate Turbine Hall Commission Series or Murakami’s first solo show in the United States ©Murakami (2007) at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles.

4 Visuo-verbal communication devices can be understood as exhibition catalogues, press releases, flyers, image films, website designs, the visual identity (logos, font, graphics), and advertisements in public space such as posters.

5 See Tate’s press release for Superflex‘ One Two Three Swing! (2017): ‘An orange line connecting dozens of three-seated swings weaves through the Turbine Hall, emerging onto the landscape outside Tate Modern where it will activate the space and continue to extend over time. Conceived as an assembly line for collective movement, the work invites audiences to combat social apathy through collaborative action, joining together on the count of three […].’

6 Original in German: ‘Der spektakuläre Ankauf der Richterschen Bilder bestätigt erneut den hohen künstlerischen Rang dieses Werkes und nobilitiert den Künstler zu einem lebenden Klassiker des 20. Jahrhunderts.’ In H. Butin, ‘Richters RAF-Zyklus nach New York verkauft: kultureller Gewinn oder Verlust?,’ in KUNSTFORUM International: Die Zukunft der Körpers, 132 (1995), 432.

7 See ‘Die Last der braunen Barren [The Burden of Brown Ingots]’, Der Spiegel 24 (1998), 116–118.

8 See also Cowell (1998).