Judging by intensity

By LINDA HERRICK

When Swiss art curator Harald Szeemann flies into Auckland next week, he has to make an expensive decision about something he has never seen before. Szeemann will make the final call on the inaugural $50,000 Walters Prize, to be announced at a dinner at Auckland Art Gallery next Tuesday.

All the artists will be there - Michael Stevenson, Yvonne Todd, Gavin Hipkins and John Reynolds - as Szeemann announces his findings, which are bound to be controversial whatever his choice.

But what gives this man from Europe the right to come here to judge our artists, and what does he know - if anything - about our art?

Corresponding by fax and email - with some difficulty, because of time and language differences - the ever-busy 69-year-old is briefly at his home in the Ticino region, south of the Swiss Alps.

Szeemann says he has no preconceptions about the work of the four finalists and will start the assessment process only when he gets here.

"I come with a clean mind. I have, of course, a lot of documentation about the New Zealand art scene but maybe my agenda doesn't let me consult it. I prefer, anyway, to see the works. I'm informed but it's not enough. I always have to see."

Szeemann has a long and formidable reputation in international contemporary art circles. In 1961, aged 28, he was appointed director of the Kunsthalle Art Museum in Bern, which he turned into a magnet for a new generation of American and European artists.

But, disillusioned with answering to pay masters who didn't understand what he was doing, Szeemann has been an independent, roving curator since 1969.

He is credited with thematically revolutionising 1972's "Documenta 5" (or fifth) forum in Kassel, Germany, a five-yearly event regarded as the leading contemporary art symposium in Europe, surpassing the Venice Biennale in terms of visitor numbers.

"Documenta 5 was crucial because it dealt with a completely new sense of art," the director of the Ludwig Museum in Cologne told the New York Times. "The focus was not so much on the product but the process, as with conceptual art," noting that conceptual art in Germany - and the artists - had been suppressed by the Nazis.

"Documenta always emphasised the vision of the individual curator," Szeemann also told the New York Times. "They say that since my Documenta, it took a new turn. The curator became like a painter."

In 1980 Szeemann was appointed co-organiser of the Venice Biennale, and set up the "Aperto" (Open) exhibition spaces for younger artists, a position which presaged his later position as the biennale director in 1999 and last year - the first year New Zealand artists were invited to attend.

But his choices have been attacked at times. His inclusion of a high number of artists from China in the 99 Biennale attracted strong criticism, with one Guardian writer charging, "There are Chinese artists everywhere".

"I got thoroughly fed up with it," Szeemann said later. "There's always some sourpuss who is angry because he thinks his country is under-represented."

Since last year's Venice Biennale, Szeemann has curated "two important exhibitions: Marcel Duchamp in Basel, and Money and Value/The Last Taboo, a pavilion for the Swiss National Bank in Expo 02 at Biel".

Duchamp ran until the end of June; Money and Value continues until October.

When judging work, Szeemann says he doesn't have a critical approach. "First, I try to catch the intensity of the artist's intentions and then through reflection about the energy I come to a result. Any comparison comes out of my collective memory."

Contemporary art's incorporation of multi-media still mystifies many members of the public who ask, "Where are the paintings?" John Reynolds is the only painter among the Walters finalists. This year, there is none among the similarly modelled Tate Britain Turner Prize finalists.

So what? Get used to it, says Szeemann. "Art changes more rapidly than the comprehension. When the intensity of the work leads the artist to choose the adequate media, I don't see difficulties. If the media choice is [based on] fashion, I think it's a negative point."

Aside from the prize money, contemporary art prizes such as the Walters can boost the connection between artists and the public, Szeemann believes.

If there is a key to the process informing Szeemann's choice for the Walters Prize, it's the word he uses over and over again: intensity. "The only thing that interests me is the intensity of a work of art or an artist," he has said. "The rest I couldn't care about ... I can allow myself to put it so simplistically because everyone knows how complex my way of thinking is."

* The Walters Prize winner will be announced next Tuesday. The finalists' exhibition continues at the New Gallery until August 25. Szeemann will give his only public lecture at Auckland Art Gallery next Monday at 6pm. Bookings are essential, ph (09) 307 7693.