2657 - Ulay - Irritation - There Is a Criminal Touch to Art. Two gelatin-silver prints on Kodak paper. 1976. Sheet dimensions: 25.5 x 20.5 cm.

Ulay - Irritation - There Is a Criminal Touch to Art. Two gelatin-silver prints on Kodak paper. 1976. Sheet dimensions: 25.5 x 20.5 cm. The two photographs were taken during Ulay’s legendary “art theft” in 1976. On December 12, the performance artist stole the painting “The Poor Poet” by Carl Spitzweg from Berlin’s Neue Nationalgalerie. After taking the work off the wall, he fled through a fire door, drove his black Citroën to Kreuzberg, and brought “The Poor Poet” to the apartment of a Turkish migrant worker family, where he hung it above the sofa in the living room. - The entire action was documented by cameraman Jörg Schmidt-Reitwein, who followed Ulay in a van. Berlin gallery owner Mike Steiner financed and produced the resulting video work, “There Is a Criminal Touch in Art,” together with television director Wilma Kottusch. His studio gallery subsequently distributed the video as well as a publication documenting both the action and the press coverage. - The specific role that Marina Abramović, Ulay’s partner at the time, played in the action is not entirely clear. What is certain is that she was present in the museum and captured the moment when Ulay took the painting off the wall; she likely also documented the rest of the action. - The photographs on hand show photographer Jörg Schmidt-Reitwein together with Wilma Kottusch in a fur coat and together with Mike Steiner. - In conjunction with the current exhibition “Ulay, Ulay & Abramovic” at the Neue Nationalgalerie in Berlin. - Provenance: Estate of Mike Steiner, Berlin.