Posted on 11/07/2011 2:45:53 PM PST by Red Badger
BERLIN - A modern art installation valued at euro800,000 ($1.1 million) was damaged after an overzealous cleaning woman scrubbed away a patina intended to look like a dried rain puddle, a Dortmund official said Friday.
Martin Kippenberger's "When it Starts Dripping from the Ceiling" remains in place at the city's Ostwall museum, despite the damage sustained earlier this month when a cleaner scrubbed away the painted puddle beneath a rubber trough placed under a stacked tower of wooden slats.
The work by Kippenberger, a German-born artist who died in 1997, was on loan to the museum from a private collector, who agreed that it should remain on display despite the incident, said Dortmund city spokeswoman Dagmar Papajewski. In the meantime, insurance adjusters are assessing the damage.
It has not yet been decided whether the patina would be restored, or if the artwork would be left in its newly "cleaned" condition, Papajewski said.
"It will be up to the collector to decide," Papajewski said. "We can't consult Kippenberger about it."
Papajewski said the company that employed the cleaning staff had instructed them to stay at least 20 centimeters (8 inches) away from the artwork and it was not clear why the patina had fallen victim to the woman's scrubbing brush.
"This company has been working with us since last October," Papajewski said.
Kippenberger's works have been displayed at New York's Museum of Modern Art and London's Tate Modern.
That is one expensive, ugly litter box! No responsible and descent cat would go even near that.
That’s why I don’t work as a janitor in a modern art museum. I’d have taken half the works out to the dumpster.
Looks like a pretty nice litter box with a little gravel. ;-)
That’s trash, not art. Good for the cleaning lady doing a thorough job - she’s worth more that all the product this clown ever produced. The fools that pay money for that kind of dreck are on their own, but government entities that pay for plop art and other degraded dung heaps need to be canned. For that matter, art budgets at all levels of gub’mint should be terminated and artists should go back to starving. Let them eat cake on some idiot’s dime in NY or the left coast.
Das RippenDrippenFrauleinenSchmaltzerkleiner
...until the cleaning woman removes the hair.
When I saw the headline I thought this was actual art that was damaged, like something from one or more centuries ago. That’s just popsicle sticks and a hibachi pot.
“...until the cleaning woman removes the hair.”
And then eats the booger! Oh wait! That was in “Caddy Shack.”
I like the artwork in the background: “White Wall” is amazing how it portrays the stark reality of life.
“Row of Pictures with Uneven Spacing” is also interesting, but harder to understand.
So were they able to raise enough money to get the roof on the museum fixed?
Would make an interesting trellis for pole beans.
Mexican cleaning lady?
I feel your pain, similar thing happened to me only it was crumbs from my toaster sitting on my counter.......it was there and now it is gone, but we have our memories and even that fades...... Sigh
They are lucky. If I were cleaning I would have probably dumped it in the dumpster.
I think the cleaning lady had the right idea.
It looks like something made out of giant popsicle sticks.
It’s on loan from a private collector, who sobered up one day and didn’t want it in his house anymore. ;’D
The worst part of this whole deal is, Herman Cain sexually harassed this cleaning woman, that’s why she got overzealous.
Thanks Red Badger.
Indeed that is an incredible work o fart.
Oops, did I typo that line?
Art intervention!
Modern "art". What a freakin' racket. My kids build more artistic looking stuff out of scrap lumber. Geeez.....
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