Iphigenie,

1973

The print Iphigenie is based on a photograph taken during one of Joseph Beuys’s most compelling performances, Titus/Iphigenie at Experimenta III in Frankfurt in May 1969. The performance featured a white horse eating hay while a microphone amplified the noise of its hooves. At the front of the stage, Beuys performed various actions using a microphone, sugar, and margarine, occasionally placing a piece of iron on his head or playing an orchestral cymbal. Wearing a long fur coat, he quoted, interpreted, and commented on two classic texts: Goethe’s Iphigenie auf Tauris (1779) and Shakespeare’s Titus Andronicus (1589–92). Meanwhile, a tape emitted excerpts from both plays. Beuys’s performance links Titus Andronicus with the excessive violence and cruelty of Nazi crimes and with Iphigenie auf Tauris (today Crimea). In the story, Iphigenie, the personification of humanity, redeems her brother Orestes through her love and forgiveness. The white horse confirms the importance of shamanism at the core of the performance. A follower of shamanistic practices, Beuys strongly believed in art’s power to heal.

When Beuys took on the subject of Iphigenie, his personal experience of Crimea was likely a significant motivation. He often described being rescued by a band of Tartars after his plane crashed over Crimea during World War II. Whether real or mythical, the story suggests a fable of death and rebirth in which Beuys is purged of his wartime guilt and brought back to life by nomadic people.