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\date{}

\begin{document}

Florian Cramer\\
Prince \#304\\
University of Massachusetts\\
Amherst, MA 01003\\
(413)546-2561

\hypertarget{autonomy-and-space---hans-haackes-systems-aesthetics}{%
\section{Autonomy and Space - Hans Haacke's systems
aesthetics}\label{autonomy-and-space---hans-haackes-systems-aesthetics}}

Final paper for Art History 625, Nature in Contemporary Art\\
Instructor: Anne Mochon\\
December 10, 1992

\hypertarget{haacke-in-the-1960s-and-since-the-1970s}{%
\section{1. Haacke in the 1960s and since the
1970s}\label{haacke-in-the-1960s-and-since-the-1970s}}

When preparing this paper, I was interested in the relation of Hans
Haacke's sculptural `real-time systems' from the 1960s and the
political-educational installations for which he is known today and
which a critic called his ``mature'' work.\footnote{Benjamin H.D.
  Buchloh, ``Hans Haacke: Memory and Instrumental Reason'', in: Art in
  America, vol.76, Feb.~1988, p.~157.} Was there a radical rupture in
his aesthetics around 1970, likely under the impression of the left-wing
protests of that time and in which Haacke participate ? Haacke himself
seems to back up such a reading, since he avoids to comment upon his
early work and did not even show it in his 1987 retrospective.\footnote{``Unfinished
  Business'', Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1987.} The earliest piece
included was ``Nachrichten'' (``News'') from 1970, a teletype machine
which, by constantly printing news agency messages, puts political and
media reality back into the museum space.

\begin{figure}
\centering
\includegraphics{pics/01-nachrichten.jpg}
\caption{Hans Haacke, News (1970)}
\end{figure}

Haacke's didactic depictions of interrelated political and economic
power and cultural representation in later text-image installations like
``The Chocolate Master'' from 1982 seem to have little in common with
Haacke's early `real-time systems' like the ``Condensation Cube'' from
1965 which, in its minimalist appearance, resembles sculptures made
around the same time by Robert Morris,\footnote{``there are obvious
  structural, material, and morphological similarities between a work
  like Haacke's `Conden sation Cube' {[}\ldots{}{]} and, for example,
  Robert Morris's `Mirrored Cubes' (1965)'', Buchloh p.~106.} Sol LeWitt
and the German `Zero' group of Heinz Mack, Guenther Uecker and Otto
Piene to which Haacke had been loosely associated in the early
1960s.\footnote{Aside from `Zero', David Craven mentions the French
  ``Group de récherche visuel'' as a major influence on the young Haacke
  who studied in Paris in 1960 and 1961. Although it promoted a
  formalist Op Art aesthetic, the GRAV shifted towards radical political
  critique in the late 1960s, according to David Craven, ``Hans Haacke
  and the Aesthetics of Dependency Theory'', in: Arts Magazine, vol.~61,
  March 1987, p.~56-7.}

Echoing the visual language of his early work, Haacke's ``U.S. Isolation
Box, Grenada, 1983'', a wooden box used by the U.S. Army to jail
prisoners at Point Salines airport, however suggests a more complex
relation between the two periods of his work. Haacke explain that ``when
I read about the isolation boxes in the New York Times, I immediately
recognized their striking similarity to the standard minimal cube. As
you see, one can recycle `minimalism' and put it to a contemporary
use''.\footnote{Quoted from: Yve-Alain Bois, Douglas Crimp, Rosalind
  Krauss, ``A Conversation with Hans Haacke'', in: October 30, Fall
  1984, Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, p.~26.}

\begin{figure}
\centering
\includegraphics{pics/04-isolation_box_grenada_1983.jpg}
\caption{Hans Haacke, U.S. Isolation Box, Grenada (1983)}
\end{figure}

Beyond such seemingly parodistic references, both periods seem to be
connected through a set of common concepts and either explicit or
implicit notions of system, context and autonomy, as well as reality and
truth. These notions have been addressed and made problematic throughout
Haacke's work, and also suggest a specific approach to the ``nature''
and ``art'' dichotomy.\footnote{I found few critical texts supporting
  this hypothesis. Craven observes the importance of `systematic
  thinking' for Haacke throughout his career and suggests a relatedness
  to General Systems Theory, but rather argues with biographical and
  political circumstances than through an actual analysis of Haacke's
  work (Craven, p.~57). Buchloh states that ``Haacke seems to have
  recognized by 1969 that the aesthetic object was constituted as both a
  discursive and a material object whose possible reading emerged at the
  intersection of several determining factors: artistic (linguistic)
  conventions, the practices of institutional power, the ideological
  investment and economic needs of a shifting audience'' (p.~106).
  Buchloh also observes a demasking of `autonomy' in Haacke's work.
  However, I will try to point out that autonomy and institutional space
  have already been addressed as being problematic in Haacke's early
  `real-time systems', so that the shift in his aesthetic was less a
  question of the target, but of the approach. Jack Burnham's ``Steps in
  the Formulation of Real-Time Political Art'' (in: "Framing and Being
  Framed, New York: New York University Press, 1975, p.~127-141) is
  close to my attempt by reconstructing a continuity within Haacke's
  work through General System Theory. However, I missed a discussion of
  how Haacke's revised or structurally modified his systems approach in
  the 1970s (since at least some kind of rupture occurred in his work).}

\hypertarget{the-condensation-cube-as-a-paradigmatic-real-time-system}{%
\section{2. The ``Condensation Cube'' as a paradigmatic `real-time
system'}\label{the-condensation-cube-as-a-paradigmatic-real-time-system}}

In its interrogation of space, Haacke's ``condensation cube'' of 1965 is
prototypical for most of his sculptural work before 1970. The cube
contains water that condenses and produces patterns on the glass surface
whenever spectators enter the gallery space and thereby raise the room
temperature. Next to minimalism, this seemingly simple piece reflects,
through the dynamic of the water within the cube, another major current
of 1960s art, kinetic sculpture, as it had been developed by the Zero
group. But at the same time, it goes beyond both of the two aesthetics:
The hard-edge minimalist form exists in a tension with the fluid,
amorphous contents of the cube and its processual state. As opposed to
classical kinetic sculpture, its dynamism is natural and not
mechanical.\footnote{On the distinctiveness of `natural' movement in
  Haacke's cube: Jack Burnham, ``Beyond Modern Sculpture'', New York:
  George Braziller, {[}year of issue not mentioned{]}, p.~279.} As a
hybrid of `natural' and `artificial' form, function, and material, the
cube represents - as a critic wrote - an ``alternative kinetic
tradition'' where ``{[}t{]}he environment took precedence over the
object''.\footnote{Nicholas J. Capasso, ``Environmental Art: Strategies
  for Reorientation in Nature'', in: Arts Magazine, vol.59, January
  1985, p.~74.}

\begin{figure}
\centering
\includegraphics{pics/03-condensation_cube.jpg}
\caption{Hans Haacke, Condensation Cube (1965)}
\end{figure}

For analyzing the communicative function of the ``Condensation Cube'',
four sculptural dimensions and their interrelatedness could be
described: form, inherent process, gallery space and spectator. The form
of the cube harmonizes with the gallery space and the context of a
modern art exhibition, but contrasts both with spectators in their
nature as human organisms and with its internal, organic condensation
process.

Spectator and process do not only exist as parallels, but they directly
interact with each other, in a double structure: water and cube relate
to each other in the same way as spectator and gallery space while
spectator and space contrast with each other in the same way as water
and cube.

\begin{figure}
\centering
\includegraphics{pics/diagram-01.png}
\caption{diagram}
\end{figure}

{[}Material entities, the cube versus the spectator in the room, are
juxtaposed to formal entities, cubic form and gallery space, versus
spectator and internal process.{]}

The object thus draws its surrounding space into question and makes the
context ``art'' problematic.

Haacke confirms these observations in a manifesto written in the same
year:

\begin{quote}
make something, which experiences, reacts to its environment, changes,
is nonstable\ldots{} \ldots{}make something indeterminate, which always
looks different, the shape of which cannot be predicted
precisely\ldots{}

\ldots{}make something, which cannot `perform' without the assistance of
its environment\ldots{}. \ldots{}make something which reacts to light
and temperature changes, is subject to air currents and depends, in its
functioning, on the forces of gravity\ldots{}

\ldots{}make something, which the `spectator' handles, with which he
plays and thus animates it\ldots{}.

\ldots{}make something, which lives in time and make the `spectator'
experience time\ldots{}

\ldots{}articulate something natural\ldots{}"\footnote{in: Peter Selz,
  ``Directions in Kinetic Sculpture'', Berkeley: University of
  California Press, 1966, p.~37}
\end{quote}

The notions of indeterminacy and interactivity combined with Haacke's
desire to articulate ``something natural'', point to additional aspects
of the ``Condensation Cube'': Indeterminacy is conceptualized here,
unlike in the music of John Cage or the Fluxus `events' of the 1960s,
rather as a natural property than as an intellectual or compositional
concept. The organic interaction of spectator and cube thus supersedes
more constructed attempts of including the audience. Nature therefore is
a fifth, implicit dimension of the condensation cube's aesthetics, as a
space beyond the gallery space.

\begin{figure}
\centering
\includegraphics{pics/diagram-02.png}
\caption{diagram}
\end{figure}

An equivalence of spectator, process and nature is juxtaposed to form
and space, and questions the unity of the artwork whose form does not
correspond to its internal process. By articulating ``something
natural'', the context `art' collapses; the object dissolves, the space
is being put into question.

\hypertarget{a-real-time-systems-aesthetic}{%
\section{3. A `Real Time Systems'
Aesthetic?}\label{a-real-time-systems-aesthetic}}

Haacke's ``Ice Stick'' from 1966 continues the ``Condensation Cube'''s
discourse. Simply consisting of a refrigerator tube, the object
interacts with the spectator's breath. Moisture condenses to random,
processual ice formations.\footnote{As explained by Burnham in ``Beyond
  Modern Sculpture'', p.~347.} As in the ``Condensation Cube'', there is
a tension between the tube as a linear-shaped, artificial means that
formally corresponds with the gallery space and the organic interaction
between spectators and the object: spectators receive coldness for the
moisture they provide. Since it is not form which limits this process,
but the surrounding space, the museum context is even more obviously
being questioned in this piece.

\begin{figure}
\centering
\includegraphics{pics/05-ice_stick.jpg}
\caption{Hans Haacke, Ice Stick (1966)}
\end{figure}

Although the ``Photo-electric viewer-controlled coordinate system'' from
1968 is, in its technological character, closer to Zero aesthetics, its
actual performance is based on organic processes: optic sensors
transform the spectator's movements into light patterns, human activity
is necessary to activate the system.\footnote{Technical explanation in
  Jack Burnham, ``The Aesthetics of Intelligent Systems'', in: Edward F.
  Fry (ed.), ``On the Future of Art'', New York: The Viking Press, 1970,
  p.~108. (As a curator at Guggenheim Museum and responsible for the
  cancelled Haacke exhibition in 1971, Fry was subsequently fired by the
  direction.)}

\begin{figure}
\centering
\includegraphics{pics/06-photoelectric_viewer_programmed_coordinate_system.jpg}
\caption{Hans Haacke, Photo-electric viewer-controlled coordinate system
(1968)}
\end{figure}

In contrast, ``Spray of Ithaca Falls: Freezing and Melting on a Rope''
from 1969, which simply consists of a rope attached above a water fall
in winter,\footnote{Jack Burnham, ``Great Western Salt Works'', New
  York: George Braziller, 1974, p.~32.} excludes the spectator from its
material constitution. There is no artificial surrounding space to be
problematized, and the implanted-artificial object vanishes under the
constantly changing ice formations on its surface.

Despite their differences, Haacke's early `real-time systems' share a
set of common characteristics:

\begin{enumerate}
\def\labelenumi{\arabic{enumi}.}
\item
  They exceed visual experience, or, as Burnham explains, ``since the
  early 1960s Hans Haacke has depended upon the invisible components of
  systems. In a systems context, invisibility, or invisible parts, share
  equal importance with things seen.''\footnote{Burnham, Saltworks,
    p.~22.}
\item
  Their dynamic is organic, even in the photo-electric system.
\item
  They are not symbolic, or at least avoid symbolism: ``they are what
  they are''.\footnote{Burnham, Beyond Modern Sculpture, p.~34/7.}
\item
  Despite their processual and interactive character, they are stable
  entities by themselves. Through their time dimension, they subvert the
  dimension of space. Still, their processual character never threatens
  the object in its functioning and integrity.
\item
  Therefore, the gallery space as a static and artificial environment
  alienates the piece, which conversely alienates this space.
\end{enumerate}

These observations match with what Haacke writes in a statement from
January 1968: ``A `sculpture' that physically reacts to its environment
is no longer to be regarded as an object. {[}It is a process; see point
1 - F.C.{]} The range of outside factors affecting it, as well as its
own radius of action, reaches beyond the space it occupies {[}beyond art
as the institutional context; point 4, F.C.{]}. It thus merges with the
environment in a relationship that is better understood as a''system' of
interdependent processes. These processes evolve without the viewer's
empathy. {[}They are not perceived like classical art works, they do not
aim for a psychological effect, point 3{]} He becomes a witness. A
system is not imagined, it is real."\footnote{Lucy R. Lippard, ``Six
  Years'', New York: Praeger Publishers, 1973, p.~37}

It is real and not symbolic; and despite its indeterminacy and openness,
it remains stable, regulating itself through a metabolism. It is
remarkable that Haacke speaks of `systems' in his statement, not of
`sculpture' or `art', thus pointing to the significance of General
Systems Theory for his early work. My analysis of the ``Condensation
Cube'' could be more or less conclusive because it was applied Systems
Theory, like Haacke's cube itself. A detailed account of this influence
is given in the writings of Jack Burnham, a sculptor, critic and,
according to his own testimony, close friend of Haacke since
1962.\footnote{Burnham, Real-Time Political Art, p.~128. On page 131,
  Burnham states that ``from 1965 to the present {[}1975, F.C.{]} Haacke
  has identified his art with ideas implicit in General Systems Theory''
  and gives extensive comments on page 132 and 133. (The close
  relationship of Haacke and Burnham and the sheer quantity of Burnham's
  writing in the late 1960s and early 1970s creates the temptation of
  considering their thinking identical and to read Burnham's statements
  about Haacke and Systems Theory as `official' explications. Burnham's
  failure of fully recognizing Haacke's paradigm shift however is reason
  enough for caution. My section on General Systems Theory is therefore
  based on my own readings.)}

\hypertarget{general-systems-theory-a-brief-outline}{%
\section{4. General Systems Theory: A Brief
Outline}\label{general-systems-theory-a-brief-outline}}

First efforts of formulating comprehensive theories of systems were done
by scientists in the 1920s and 1930s, but with the publication of the
book ``General System Theory'' in 1949, the Austrian biologist Ludwig
von Bertalanffy established it as comprehensive theory and
discipline.\footnote{According to Ervin Laszlo, ``The Systems View of
  the World'', New York: George Braziller, 1972, p.~10.} As he explains
in his essay ``The History and Status of General Systems Theory'',
systems theory departs from Aristotle's observation that the whole is
more than the sum of its parts.\footnote{In: George J. Klir (ed.),
  ``Trends in General Systems Theory'', New York: Interscience, 1972,
  p.~21.} General Systems Theory thus promotes a holistic approach to
science, rejecting the atomistic, specialized disciplines and methods of
modern sciences. Bertalanffy insists that this holism is strictly
scientific, unlike occult holisms (such as, for example, alchemy,
Neoplatonist philosophy or Kabbalah).\footnote{Laszlo, p.~19, History \&
  Status, p.~21, and Guenter Ropohl, ``Einfuehrung in die allgemeine
  Systemtheorie'', p.~10 (in: Hans Lenk, Guenter Ropohl {[}ed.{]},
  ``Systemtheorie als Wissenschaftsprogramm'', Koenigstein/Ts.,
  Athenaeum-Verlag, 1978, p.~9-49).} Drawing on the Greek word
``systema'' (``collection''), General Systems Theory regards every
phenomenon as a system and investigates its organization instead of its
single parts by describing relations, hierarchies and interactions of
parts within a system.\footnote{Ropohl, p.~9 \& p.~14.}

As opposed to cybernetics, which investigates interaction in
human-machine systems, and systems analysis, which looks for practical
solutions of structural problems, General Systems Theory is an
interdisciplinary all-purpose discipline whose scope includes hard
sciences as well as social sciences and humanities.\footnote{Ropohl,
  p.~11-13.}

According to General Systems Theory, a system can be principally
investigated and classified as natural or cultural, dynamic or static,
indeterminate or deterministic, temporal or fixed, complex or simple,
stable or unstable, autonomous or dependent, open or closed;\footnote{Ropohl,
  p.~34, History \& Status, p.~24.} the same criteria and polarities
that I described above as being constitutive for Haacke's ``real-time
systems''.

An central concept of General Systems Theory that also reverberates in
Haacke's early works is that of the open system. It was coined and
defined by Bertalanffy in 1950.\footnote{Ludwig von Bertalanffy, ``The
  Theory of Open Systems in Physics and Biology'', reprinted in: F.E.
  Emery, ``Systems Thinking'', Harmondsworth, England: Penguin Books,
  1969, p.~70-85.} For Bertalanffy, all organisms are open systems,
since they change their components and interact with their
environment.\footnote{Open Systems, p.~70.} This metabolic interaction
maintains and stabilizes the object, because it reverses
entropy.\footnote{Open Systems, p.~71-72, Laszlo, p.~42-43.} According
to the second thermodynamic law, entropy occurs only in closed systems.
Open systems are therefore self-regulating, they can be
time-independent, and their initial state does not predetermine their
final state.\footnote{Bertalanffy calls the latter characteristic
  ``equifinality'', Open Systems, p.~73-77, Laszlo, p.~46.}

Haacke's cube is an open and a closed system at the same time: it
interacts with the room temperature, but its contents is limited by the
cubic frame. The cubic form and the gallery space thus act as closed,
entropic systems.

\begin{figure}
\centering
\includegraphics{pics/diagram-03.png}
\caption{diagram}
\end{figure}

With its very general categories of analysis and description, General
Systems Theory clearly aims to be a universal theory, a model that can
be applied to and explain virtually anything.\footnote{History \&
  Status, p.~25, Laszlo, p.~79.} This has provoked criticism,
particularly in the social sciences where the idea of societies as
``self-regulating'' and ``self-stabilizing'' systems caused
discomfort.\footnote{Laszlo, p.~120.}

Both in Bertalanffy's and in other early system theoretical writings,
there is a strong implicit claim for scientific objectivity and truth.
This is echoed in Haacke's statements that ``a system is not imagined,
it is real''\footnote{In: Lippard, Six Years, p.~3/7.} and that ``the
working premise is to think in terms of systems. {[}\ldots{}.{]} In all
cases, verifiable processes are referred to''.\footnote{In: Lippard,
  ``Six Years'', p.~123.}

\hypertarget{haackes-paradigm-shift}{%
\section{5. Haacke's Paradigm Shift}\label{haackes-paradigm-shift}}

In the later General Systems Theory known among others as radical
constructivism, the earlier objective truth claims were radically
revised. It defines all systems as constructions. Even the act of
considering something a system, is a construction.\footnote{Ropohl,
  p.~32.}. System analysis then acts as a tool and does not tell the
objective truth about a thing.\footnote{Burnham ends with the same
  conclusion, ``Real-Time Political Art'', p.~133.}

Haacke might have had taken a similar turn when he radically changed his
art. Perhaps this was motivated by the temporary contradiction between
his political engagement in the Art Workers' Coalition in 1969, which
focused on the complicity of art establishment and political
establishment,\footnote{Lucy Lippard and Adrian Henri give detailed
  accounts of political activism in the art world of the early 1970s,
  including the Art Workers' Coalition and the Guerilla Art Action
  Group. Only Henri, however, notices the striking similarities with the
  activities of the Paris-based Situationist International. Lacking any
  mention of the S.I., Lippard's text suggests that Situationism was
  largely unknown to New York artists at that time, including, I
  suppose, Haacke himself. Lucy R. Lippard, ``Get the Message'', New
  York: E.P. Dutton, 1984; Adrian Henri, ``Total Art'', New York \&
  Washington: Praeger Publishers, 1974.} and his system sculptures
implying truth, stability and spaces that construct autonomy from their
surrounding.

\begin{figure}
\centering
\includegraphics{pics/diagram-03.png}
\caption{diagram}
\end{figure}

The ``condensation cube'' is open, self-regulating and autonomous as a
system in particular, but not in regard to its closed context, the art
space as the super-system it depends on. Referring to nature as a utopia
or non-space, the cube subverts its space perhaps symbolically, but not
in reality, thus undermining Haacke's program. We could thus read
Haacke's later work as the attempt to address this space itself,
directly and not metaphorically, in order to make the inherent critique
of the piece succeed. This however affects the supposed `autonomy' of
the art object. Autonomy is no longer possible, because there is no
object outside a space and no space outside institutions. The object
thus needed to be re-conceptualized from scratch.\footnote{``It is
  important to recognize that artists who nevertheless continue to
  reject the idea of aesthetic autonomy have also had to abandon
  traditional procedures of artistic production''; Buchloh, p.~101.}

There is an eclectic fusion of Systems Theory, the Marxist concept of
the politically engaged artist and the {[}German{]} romanticist notion
of art as a continuously expanding universal system\footnote{Friedrich
  Schlegel, ``Athenaeums-Fragmente'', Jena 1798.} in Haacke's statement
that ``the artist's business requires his involvement in practically
everything. {[}\ldots{}{]} An artist is not an isolated system. In order
to survive {[}\ldots{}{]} he has to continuously interact with the world
around him. Theoretically, there are no limits to his
involvement''.\footnote{Burnham, Salt Works, p.~32-3.} Haacke points
towards a shift here to the larger super-system of politics and economy
while still clinging to his earlier holistic systems approach to art.

By investigating the structure of complex organizations and opposing
atomistic alienation, both General Systems Theory and Marxism could be
described as holistic. Their fundamental difference however lies in
Marxism's categorical refusal to project biological onto social
structures, or nature onto culture. On the contrary, ``biology'' and
``nature'' can be described as social and ideological constructs from a
Marxist perspective. Haacke might have drawn a similar conclusion when
he broke with his early art.

From the 1970s on, his works appear so radically different, because
``nature'' as the larger context or superstructure has been replaced
with political and economical superstructures. Apart from that, the
structures of Haacke's works in both periods remain similar. ``The
Chocolate Master'', for example, can be analyzed with basically the same
model as the one that I used for the ``Condensation Cube'', by
describing the systemic interrelations of its dimensions of form, text,
spectator and (art) space.

\begin{figure}
\centering
\includegraphics{pics/02-pralinenmeister.jpg}
\caption{Hans Haacke, The Chocolate Master (1982)}
\end{figure}

In the ``Chocolate Master'', the form of the piece is no longer
isomorphic to the art space, since the object does not look like a
contemporary artwork, but like an advertising campaign: a piece of
everyday communication familiar to the spectator, and - at the same time
- speaking the language of those who economically own and rule the
space. The contrast of form and space, mediated through the text, thus
replaces the previous contrast of form and process. Process, and the
dimension of time, has been removed or frozen to stress the dominance of
space, the idea that there is no outside of the institution.\footnote{Buchloh,
  p.~98.} Subversion of the space no longer occurs in a process, but in
the text that ties the codes of power (advertisement) to the space of
the museum. Since the form of the piece makes use of accessible everyday
visual language, it alienates the spectator from the museum space. The
space ``does not fit', the spectator is made aware of the contradiction
between the space of the museum and its suggestions of an `autonomous'
or `free' sphere, and the political and economic superstructure behind
it. The space of the museum is thus unmasked as being highly dependent
and drawn into question by the object. The effectiveness of Haacke's
critique is proven by Benjamin Buchloh observation that''the reception
of Haacke's work does prove is that the supposedly all-embracing
liberalism of high-cultural institutions and of the market may be far
more selective than is generally believed".\footnote{Buchloh, p.~98.}

\hypertarget{concluding-remarks}{%
\section{6. Concluding Remarks}\label{concluding-remarks}}

In my analysis of the ``Condensation Cube'', I drew the conclusion that
\emph{the object draws the whole space into question and makes the
context `art' problematic}. In Haacke's later work, nature as the
seemingly necessary counterpart for creating this opposition, has been
relinquished - as it seems, as a fiction and construction like the art
space itself. On top of this, the art object no longer pretends to be
autonomous and transgressing the institutional space in which it is
shown. On the contrary, the object imitates the codes of the institution
to turn them against itself and show up its contradictions. This
strategy strongly resembles the estrangement method in Brecht's epic
theatre as well as the Situationist ``détournement''.\footnote{On Haacke
  and Brecht's estrangement method: Yves-Alain Bois, ``The Antidote'',
  in: October no. 39, Winter 1986, p.~128-144.}

When once more comparing the ``Condensation Cube'' and the ``Isolation
Box'', a similar critique of the art space can be observed, with the
difference that the ``Isolation Box'' insists on the signature that
every space puts on an object, and the ideological character of any
visual language. In its attempted subversion of its museum space, the
``Condensation Cube'' relies on its supposed autonomy and
self-regulation while the ``Isolation Box'' describes both itself and
its surrounding space as constructs, as being dependent, and controlled
by institutions and political and economical superstructures.

\hypertarget{postscript}{%
\section{Postscript:}\label{postscript}}

This dependency also means that the even the critical art object can
always be incorporated and appropriated by the institution, `contained
in the box``, so to speak. Arthur C. Danto wrote that Haacke's
documentation of the Shapolsky real estate trust may today be read as a
glorifying homage to economic''visionaries" (because their property
chiefly consists of houses in SoHo and the Lower East Side that were
cheaply bought as slum houses in that time): ``One might almost expect
Shapolsky et al.~to acquire `Shapolsky et al.' as evidence of its
founder's sagacity''.\footnote{Arthur C. Danto, ``Hans Haacke,
  Unfinished Business'', in: The Nation, Feb.~14, 87, p.~192.} In an
interview, Haacke stated that he is well aware of such risks,\footnote{Yve-Alain
  Bois, Douglas Crimp and Rosalind Krauss, A Conversation with Hans
  Haacke, in: October no. 30, Fall 1984, p.~47.} arguing that his works
are meant to be site- and time-specific and thus limited in their
validity. This also means that his work cannot challenge superstructures
at large.

\hypertarget{bibliography}{%
\section{Bibliography}\label{bibliography}}

\hypertarget{exhibition-catalogues}{%
\subsection{1. Exhibition catalogues}\label{exhibition-catalogues}}

``Framing and Being Framed'', New York University Press, 1975

``Unfinished Business'', Cambridge, Ma.: MIT Press, 1987

\hypertarget{haacke-on-his-systems-aesthetic}{%
\subsection{2. Haacke on his systems
aesthetic}\label{haacke-on-his-systems-aesthetic}}

in: Peter Selz, ``Directions in Kinetic Sculpture'', Berkeley:
University of California Press, 1966, p.~36

in: Lucy Lippard (ed.), ``Six Years'', New York: Prager Publishers,
1973, p.~37 \& 123

in: Ursula Meyer, ``Conceptual Art'', New York: E.P. Dutton\&Co, 1972,
p.~132

\hypertarget{general-literature-on-haacke}{%
\subsection{3. General literature on
Haacke}\label{general-literature-on-haacke}}

Jack Burnham, ``Steps in the Formulation of Real-Time Political Art'',
in: ``Framed and Being Framed'', p.~127-141

Benjamin H.D. Buchloh, ``Hans Haacke: Memory and Instrumental Reason'',
in: Art in America, vol.76, Feb.1988, p.~97-108 \& 157-159

Arthur C. Danto, ``Hans Haacke: Unfinished Business'' (review), in: The
Nation, February 14, 1987, p.~190-195

\hypertarget{on-haackes-early-works}{%
\subsection{4. On Haacke's early works}\label{on-haackes-early-works}}

\hypertarget{condensation-boxes-in-the-context-of-earth-art}{%
\subsubsection{Condensation Boxes (in the context of Earth
Art):}\label{condensation-boxes-in-the-context-of-earth-art}}

Nicholas J. Capasso, ``Environmental Art: Strategies for Reorientation
in Nature'', in: Arts Magazine, vol.~59, January 1985, p.~73-777

\hypertarget{condensation-boxes-grass-cube}{%
\subsubsection{Condensation Boxes, Grass
Cube:}\label{condensation-boxes-grass-cube}}

Jack Burnham, ``Beyond Modern Sculpture'', New York: George Braziller,
{[}year of publication not mentioned{]}, p.~279, 347-348

\hypertarget{rain-tree-sky-line-photo-electric-viewer-programmed-coordinate-system-spray-of-ithaca-falls-wind-room}{%
\subsubsection{Rain Tree, Sky Line, Photo-Electric Viewer Programmed
Coordinate System, Spray of Ithaca Falls, Wind
Room:}\label{rain-tree-sky-line-photo-electric-viewer-programmed-coordinate-system-spray-of-ithaca-falls-wind-room}}

Jack Burnham, ``Great Western Salt Works'', New York: George Braziller,
1974, p.~22-3, 32-3

\hypertarget{photo-electric-viewer-programmed-coordinate-system}{%
\subsubsection{Photo-Electric Viewer Programmed Coordinate
System:}\label{photo-electric-viewer-programmed-coordinate-system}}

Jack Burnham, The Aesthetics of Intelligent Systems, in: Edward F. Fry
(ed.), On the Future of Art, New York: The Viking Press, 1970

\hypertarget{chickens-hatching}{%
\subsubsection{Chicken's Hatching:}\label{chickens-hatching}}

Jack Burnham, ``The Structure of Art'', New York: George Braziller 1971,
p.~142-143

\hypertarget{hans-haackes-re-orientation-in-1969-political-activism-art-workers-coalition-art-strikes}{%
\subsection{5. Hans Haacke's re-orientation in 1969: Political activism,
Art Workers' Coalition, Art
Strikes}\label{hans-haackes-re-orientation-in-1969-political-activism-art-workers-coalition-art-strikes}}

David Craven, ``Hans Haacke and the Aesthetics of Dependency Theory'',
in: Arts Magazine, vol.~61, March 1987, p.~56-58

Lucy R. Lippard, ``Get the Message: a decade of art for social change'',
New York: E.P. Dutton, 1984

Adrian Henri, ``Total Art'', New York \& Washington: Praeger Publishers,
1974 {[}notably the section ``Art and Politics'', p.~174-186 and the Art
Workers' Coalition document in the appendix, p.~195-197{]}

\hypertarget{the-situationist-international}{%
\subsection{6. The Situationist
International}\label{the-situationist-international}}

Ken Knabb (ed.), ``Situationist Anthology'', Berkeley: Bureau of Public
Secrets, 1981 {[}includes a selection of articles from the
``Internationale Situationniste'', the official periodical of the
S.I.{]}

Guy Debord, ``The Society of Spectacle'', Detroit: Black and Red, 1977

Sadie Plant, ``The Most Radical Gesture'', London and New York:
Routledge, 1992

Stewart Home, ``The Assault on Culture'', London: Aporia Press and
Unpopular Books, 1988

Roberto Ohrt, ``Phantom Avantgarde'', Hamburg: Edition Nautilus, 1990
{[}in German{]} .

\hypertarget{politics-and-haackes-later-work}{%
\subsection{7. Politics and Haacke's later
work}\label{politics-and-haackes-later-work}}

Frederick Jameson, ``Hans Haacke and the Cultural Logic of
Postmodernism'', in: ``Unfinished Business'', p.~38-50

Yve-Alain Bois, Douglas Crimp, Rosalind Krauss, ``A Conversation with
Hans Haacke'', in: October 30, Fall 1984, Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press,
p.~23-48

\hypertarget{haacke-in-the-context-of-postmodern-art}{%
\subsection{8. Haacke in the context of postmodern
art}\label{haacke-in-the-context-of-postmodern-art}}

Benjamin H.D. Buchloh: ``Allegorical Procedures: Appropriation and
Montage in Contemporary Art'', in: Artforum, vol.~21, Sept.~1982
(without pagination)

\hypertarget{haacke-and-brechts-estrangement-method}{%
\subsection{9. Haacke and Brecht's estrangement
method}\label{haacke-and-brechts-estrangement-method}}

Yve-Alain Bois, ``The Antidote'', in: October 39, Winter 1986,
p.~128-144

\hypertarget{general-systems-theory}{%
\subsection{10. General Systems Theory}\label{general-systems-theory}}

Ludwig von Bertalanffy, ``The Theory of Open Systems in Physics and
Biology'' (1950), reprinted in: F.E. Emery, ``Systems Thinking'',
Harmondsworth, England: Penguin Books, 1969, p.~7085

Ludwig von Bertalanffy, ``The History and Status of General Systems
Theory'', in: George J. Klir (ed.), Trends in General Systems Theory,
New York: Interscience, 1972, p.~21-41

Ludwig von Bertalanffy, ``General Systems Theory'', New York: George
Braziller, 1968

Ervin Laszlo, ``The Systems View of the World'', New York: George
Braziller, 1972

Guenter Ropohl, ``Einfuehrung in die allgemeine Systemtheorie'', in:
Hans Lenk, Guenter Ropohl (ed.), ``Systemtheorie als
Wissenschaftsprogramm'', Koenigstein/Ts.: Athenaeum Verlag, 1978,
p.~9-49

\end{document}
