Abstract
In this paper, I will first address why myth and history are inseparable by tracing the
traditional positivist history discourse to present contemporary historiography. I will
show how myth can never escape history, how mythic images function in history and
how history relies on these mythic images to form narratives (emplotment) using
examples from Kiefer’s paintings, particularly Besetzungen (Occupations) and
Margarete/Sulamith1 series. Finally I will conclude that the past is immanent in that it
takes form through ruins, monuments and such traces are reflected in Kiefer’s art.
____________________________________________________________________
I define history as ‘an account which has happened in the past’ as well as ‘what has
happened in the past’ 2. Myth, however, has a more complex definition. The most
common use of the term (by mythologists and anthropologists) is “sacred narratives of
traditional societies generally involving superhuman beings, etc."3 I will also include
the extended meaning of the word ‘myth’, where myth is socially-constructed
semiotic reference system of signs that is used in politics and society4.
Traditionally, myth and history has always been viewed as separate discourses,
especially in 19th century positivist historiography. History was viewed as a quest for
‘authentic truth’, the dialectical logos (a truth whose validity can be demostrated) to
mythos (myth) 5 This trend towards ‘unearthing the truth’ was lead by Ranke during
1
as Kiefer made over 30 paintings in that series, I will only be focussing on Die Goldenes Haar,
Margarete (Your Golden Hair, Margarete 1981)
2
Heehs, Peter (1994) Myth, History and Theory in History and Theory, Vol. 33, No. 1 pp. 1-19
3
Heehs, Peter (1994) ^
4
Barthes, Roland (1957 reprint: 2000) Mythologies trans. Johnathan Cape 1972, Vintage, Random
House UK
5
Mali, Joseph (1991) Joseph Burckhardt: Myth, History and Mythistory, History & Memory 3, 86, 113
1
the mid-nineteenth century who declared that the greatest task of a historian was to
ascertain facts about the past and use them to build a precise and objective historical
account. Myths, legends and broader interpretations of history should be avoided and
was considered harmful towards finding an objective, historical ‘truth’. 6
Contemporary historiography however, is interested in the relationship between
history and myth. All systems including positivist scientific ones, William McNeil
argues, are mythic as these systems are based on belief system built on assumptions.
Therefore in a world of competing assumptions, each group validates its own beliefs
in order "to live more comfortably, insulated from troublesome dissent." Each group
calls its own beliefs ‘truth’ while other viewpoints are ‘myths’ but other groups do the
same as well. Former historians believed they were in a position to decide which
"truth" was true and which was "myth." Nevertheless, this is not possible in the postmodern age. The best historians can do is to try to "attain a better historiographical
balance between Truth, “truths” and myth." Therefore historians produce a
presentation of "truths" that is credible and intelligible to a given audience, the such a
result is what "might best be called “mythistory."7
Another historian interested in the link between myth and history is Hayden White,
who asserts that history is a ‘poetic act’, an ‘emplotment’ of tropes which built by
mythic images to create a ‘narrative discourse’8. White asserts that “myths and the
ideologies based on them presuppose the adequacy of stories to the representation of
the reality whose meaning they purport to reveal”. In other words, he argues that the
6
Evans, Richard (2000). In Defence of History (Revised ed.). London: Granta Books. pp. 256
McNeill, William H (1986) "Mythistory, or Truth, Myth, History and Historians," American
Historical Review 91, 4, 8.
8
White, Hayden (1973) Metahistory John Hopkins University Press, Maryland
7
2
distinction that myth is less adequate than history in the explanation of ‘reality’ is a
constructed assumption, and therefore can easily dissolve.9
In Kiefer’s work, he draws upon these images of myth and history using the power of
these images to somehow transcend the history it comes from and perhaps even
towards redemption. 10 This redemption, however, relies on art’s representation of one
of the most reprehensible perspectives of history. He stated:
"I do not identify with Nero or Hitler, but I have to re-enact what they
did just a little bit in order to understand the madness."11
This ambiguity is expressed in one of Kiefer’s earlier works, Besetzungen
(Occupations) in 1969. Besetzungen is a series of photographs where Kiefer
photographs himself in different parts of Europe performing or embodying the Nazi
Seig Heil salute where Kiefer seems to play the role of a conquering National
Socialist who occupies all of Europe. 12
While the first reaction would be of shock and terror (in 1969 this symbolic gesture
would still be too recent) we note how he has perverted its power by doing it towards
the sea or an empty square, alone and dwarfed by the surroundings. This irony is
further highlighted when we compare it to the historical associations of the Seig Heil
salute, which is usually portrayed by happy Aryan masses, marching soldiers or
9
White, Hayden (1990) The Content of the Form Baltimore Press ix-xi, 40-41
Andreas Huyssen, (1989) Anslem Kiefer: The terror of history, the temptation of myth October 48
Spring, 24-25
11
Albano, Albert P. (1998) Reflections on Painting, Alchemy, Nazism: Visiting with Anselm Kiefer in
Journal of the American Institute for Conservation, Vol. 37, No. 3 pp. 348-361
12
Rosenthal, Mark. (1987) Anselm Kiefier. Exhibition organised by A. James Speyer and M
Rosenthal. Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago
10
3
alongside other symbols of Nazi imperialism and power. Kiefer cuts an absurd figure,
and the gesture seems so hopelessly futile.
13
Even the term Occupations becomes
ironic and layered in multiple ambiguities. On one level Kiefer alludes to the war
itself when Germany invaded parts of Europe, on another level Kiefer seems to
suggest the post-war Vergangenheitsbewältigung, the coping or coming-to-terms with
the past could not occur until Germany accepted the internal occupation of Fascism in
German national identity, an identity which could only be seen when reflected back
by Europe.
Particularly in image 144, Kiefer is posed with his back towards us and gesturing
towards the sea does not only allude to the symbolic Nazi salute but is also
reminiscent of another famous German work, Wanderer über dem Nebelmeer
(Wanderer above a Sea of Fog) by Romantic painter Casper David Friedreich. In
Friedreich’s painting, the wanderer is posed at the edge of the cliff looking across a
sea of fog. This form of composition where the perspective radiated from the main
figure, and the expansive depth in void created a sense of blending between heavenly
and earthly perspectives – or in Romantic terms, a sense of the ‘sublime’. 14
This allusion to the ‘sublime’ can be seen as how Fascism had perverted and abused
Germany’s literary and artistic traditions, turning mythic images and culture (such as
Wagner’s operas or Friedrich’s paintings used as a form of Nazi indoctrination) into
spectacles of power for Nazi regime.
15
This can therefore be read as an ironic
perversion of both the concept of ‘sublime’ as well as the Romantic notion of the
13
Andreas Huyssen (1989) ^
Rosenthal, Mark. (1987) see footnote 11
15
Andreas Huyssen (1989) Anslem Kiefer: The terror of history, the temptation of myth October 48
Spring, 24-25 footnote 9, 12
14
4
Anselm Kiefer, Image 144 from Besetzungen [Occupations], 1969.
From Interfunktionen. Cologne. no. 12, 1975, Book.
5
Caspar David Friedrich (1774-1840). Wanderer über dem Nebelmeer
(Wanderer Above a Sea of Fog), CA. 1817. Oil on canvas, 94.8 x 74.8 cm.
Kunsthalle, Hamburg. Photo: Bildarchiv Preussischer Kulturbestiz/Art Resource, NY.
masculine artist-hero where art/aesthetics may not always be morally ‘good’ or even
responsible, and that such mythic heroism may only lead to the delusion of Fascism.16
Another way of seeing is through the idea of theatre: the cast of a play. In Kiefer's
images, there is a crucial distinction between identification and playing a role. In the
above quote (10), he likens himself an actor who merely recites lines without
becoming the character he portrays to make a statement. In Occupations, Kiefer casts
himself in a one-man production whose subject is the Nazi image of military power
16
Roos, Bonnie (2008) Anslem Kiefer and the Art of Allusion: Dialectics of the early Margarete and
Sulamith Paintings in Comparative Literature Vol. 58, 1 pp 24-51 University of Oregon
6
and its traumatic loss. But he does not "identify[es]" with either the Nazi or the
mourner, but rather as one who consciously, ironically, almost dialectically, plays the
role of both.17 Therefore when he inhabits the role of a ‘Wanderer’ in Image 144, he is
not doing so as a revisitation towards nostalgia or repetition of the past but rather it
becomes a reclaiming of a mythic image in what has become a void of adequate
images in post-war Germany.18 This re-enactment implies a sense of historical
performativity as well where each ‘occupation’ can be seen as a tableau towards the
past.19 Such staging can be seen as a an attempt to create critical distance from the
subject matter to allow the viewer space to reflect on the nature of the Fascist myths
he depicts through foregrounding the beholder's physical distance from the fictive
space of representation.20
In Kiefer’s most allegorical series, Dein goldenes Haar, Margarete (Your Golden
Hair, Margarete) , Dein aschenes Haar, Sulamith (Your Ashen Hair, Sulamith) he
draws these titles from holocaust survivor, Paul Celan’s dirge poem ‘Todesfuge’
(Death Fugue).21 That Kiefer draws on a poem that has created debate about the
Jewish inability to reconcile the horrors of holocaust with present-Germany as well as
Germany’s coming-to-terms (Vergangenhe-itsbewältigung) is no fluke. We should
also consider the context of which Kiefer grew up in, a Germany where "Todesfuge"
has thus survived as a kind of litany, a post-war symbol of penitence for the Holocaust
17
Brailovsky, Anna (1997) The Epic Tableau: Verfremdungseffekte in Anselm Kiefer's Varus New
German Critique, No. 71, Memories of Germany, pp. 115-138
18
Andreas Huyssen (1989) Anslem Kiefer: The terror of history, the temptation of myth October 48
Spring, 24-25 footnote 9, 12, 16
19
Brailovsky, Anna (1997) The Epic Tableau: Verfremdungseffekte in Anselm Kiefer's Varus New
German Critique, No. 71, Memories of Germany, pp. 115-138
20
Brailovsky, Anna (1997) ^
21
Saltzman, Lisa (1999) Anselm Kiefer and Art After Auschwitz. New York: Cambridge University
Press
7
that was set to music, spoken aloud on television and even anthologised in high
school textbooks, or—in Nan Rosenthal's words, it was a "national obsession". 22
The mythic characters in Celan’s poem, Margarete and Sulamith function as
representations of the holocaust event as metaphorical tropes of history. The metaphor
of ‘Margarete’ is drawn from Goethe’s Faust, one of Germany’s great works of
Romantic literature. In Faust’s play, Margarete is portrayed as a woman who murders
for her selfish love23 but attains salvation through forgiveness from God. Likewise,
Sulamith is referenced from Jewish biblical tale in Song of Songs: Solomon where
she is an example of earthly love that transcends boundaries of class, race and religion
to become the favourite wife of her husband.24 Just like Margarete, Sulamith is also a
Romantic figure 25 who embodies earthly purity in the notion of ‘sublime.’26
In ‘Todesfuge’, the characters of Margarete and Sulamith are irreconcilable.
Margarete is shown to be complicit in the murder of Sulamith through her ‘man’27,
trapped on earth and unable to find heavenly salvation unlike her Faustian namesake
while Sulamith is depicted as holocaust victim who can only escape through her
‘grave in the sky’28. Additionally, Sulamith is paired with tainted Margarete and not
22
Rosenthal, Nan. (1999) Anselm Kiefer: Works on Paper in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. New
York Harry Abrams, Inc
23
The character of Margarete is an interesting one, as she murders her own child out of desperation
after being abandoned by Faust. Though she finds redemption through repentance, by no means is she
the ‘German ideal’ or ‘German heroine’ some critics make her out to be. The play is available through
Project Gutenberg: http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/2229
24
Felsteiner, John.(1993) Paul Celan: Poet. .Survivor. Jew. New Haven: Yale University Press
25
Painted in Franz Pforr’s Sulamith und Maria (Sulamith and Maria) 1811 as well as sketched by
Friedrich Overbeck , Sulamith und Maria (Sulamith and Maria), 1811-12. Overbeck’s charcoal sketch
later became retitled as Italia and Germania (1829) in the final painting.
26
Roos, Bonnie (2008) Anslem Kiefer and the Art of Allusion: Dialectics of the early Margarete and
Sulamith Paintings in Comparative Literature Vol. 58, 1 pp 24-51 see footnote 15
27
In ‘Todesfuge’ (Celan), the refrain/line: “A man lives in the house he plays with his vipers he
writes // he writes when it grows dark to Deutschland your golden hair Margaret” Some critics
(Felsteiner) have asked if perhaps the ‘man’ is doing the bidding of Margaret.
28
In ‘Todesfuge’ (Celan), the refrain/line: “Your ashen hair Sulamith we shovel a grave in the air
there there you won't lie too cramped”
8
with her Romantic counterpart of heavenly Maria. Through this bitterly ironic reversal
of their traditional roles, Celan demonstrates how impossible it is to achieve
reconciliation and that the Romantic ideal will forever be destroyed even as the
‘ashen’ Sulamith continues to bind both German and Jew in a inseparable, historical
bond.29
Dein goldenes Haar. Margarete (Your Golden Hair Margarete). 1981,
130 X 170 cm, oil and straw on canvas. Collection Sanders, Amsterdam
In Kiefer’s painting of ‘Your Golden Hair Margarete’, Margarete depicted as a burnt
and destroyed field with a weft of dried hay representing her ‘golden hair’. These
images harken to Margarete’s traditional role as peasant but slashing brushstrokes,
long perspective and dark colours suggest an earth ravaged, unhealthy and infertile.
By doing so, Kiefer evokes the devastation caused by the Holocaust, the ‘absence of
29
Roos, Bonnie (2008)^ footnote 25, 15
9
images’ that left a void in Germany 30– that she, like Margarete has to pay penance for
her sins with the spectre of Sulamith haunting in the dark shapes looming across the
landscape. Yet there is still this ‘ambivalence’ in Kiefer’s paintings that are not in
Celan’s, or as Rosenthal explains:
"In [Kiefer's landscape paintings]. we experience the earth as if our
faces were pushed close to the soil and, at the same time, as if we were
flying above the ground, but close to it"31
This ambivalence comes from the Romantic landscape perspective echoed in Kiefer’s
paintings, alluding to the mythic sublime. 32 This appropriation creates a disturbing
combination of fascination and horror, where the viewer feels lured in by the
aesthetics of myth-images yet cheated by the fetishised power of Fascism it presented.
33
The Romantic notion of ruins34 is juxtaposed against the real historical ruins left
caused by the Nazis. These ruins can be seen as conspicuous traces of the past, be it a
historical past or a mythologised one35. Kiefer then depicts the past as a form of
immanence, where the mythic images of Margarete/Sulamith are re-depicted by Celan
and finally appropriated by Kiefer to create a space where inter-subjective relations
30
Andreas Huyssen (1989) Anslem Kiefer: The terror of history, the temptation of myth October 48
Spring, 24-25 footnote 9, 12, 14
31
Rosenthal, Mark. (1987) Anselm Kiefier. Exhibition organised by A. James Speyer and M
Rosenthal. Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago footnote 13, 11 Rosenthal’s experience of ‘earth’ and
‘heaven’ echoes the Romantic Sublime; the blending of Nature’s forces into a single whole perspective
32
Arasse, Daniel (2001) Anselm Kiefer. New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc.
33
Andreas Huyssen (1989)^ footnotes 9, 12, 14, 29
34
Andreas Huyssen (1989) he describes ruins as a ‘celebration of past, nostalgia and loss’ Lisa
Saltzman brings up a similar point in Anselm Kiefer and Art after Auschwitz (1999) New York:
Cambridge University Press
35
Birth, Kevin (2003) The Immanent Past: Culture and Psyche at the Juncture of Memory and History
in ETHOS vol. 34, no. 2, pp 169-191 American Anthropological Association, University of California
Press
10
can be reconfigured and re-represented and serve as artifacts to both the past and
present3637.
In conclusion, myth and history are inseparable as they depend on each other; myth as
a form of history as well as history requiring mythic images to create national
narratives. This inseparability can be seen in Kiefer’s work, where he demonstrates
the bridge between history and myth by alluding to German ideals of Romanticism
and images of Germany’s mythic characters i.e. Margarete, ‘die Wanderer’ and using
them to translate and re-present the historical event of the Holocaust and how it
affected Germany as a whole. Therefore, Kiefer has combined history and myth to
produce an allegorical monument that both reaffirms the spectacle of Fascist power
and how their abuse of representation as well as an act of mourning – for the
holocaust, for Germany and hope for a possible sublime.
36
Trommler, Frank (1989) Germany’s Past as an Artifact in Journal of Modern History, Vol 61 no. 4
pp724- 735
37
this concept of ruins being an allusion or trace of past; or as an artefact of both is fairly common. One
of the writers is Yelvington (2002) History, Memory and Identity: A Programmatic Prolegomenon as
well as Partmentier (1987) Sacred Remains: Myth, History, and Polity
11
References:
literature which Kiefer alludes to:
Goethe, Johann Wolfgang (1806-1932) Faust I & II from Project Gutenberg:
http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/2229 last accessed 7th June 2010
Celan, Paul (1948) Todesfuge [Death Fugue] from Celan Project website (2010)
In German: http://www.celan-projekt.de/todesfuge-deutsch.html
In English: http://www.celan-projekt.de/todesfuge-englisch.html
last accessed 7th June 2010
Bibliography:
Andreas Huyssen, (1989) Anslem Kiefer: The terror of history, the temptation of
myth October 48 Spring, 24-25
Albano, Albert P. (1998) Reflections on Painting, Alchemy, Nazism: Visiting with
Anselm Kiefer in Journal of the American Institute for Conservation, Vol. 37, No. 3
pp. 348-361
Arasse, Daniel (2001) Anselm Kiefer. New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc.
Birth, Kevin (2003) The Immanent Past: Culture and Psyche at the Juncture of
Memory and History in ETHOS vol. 34, no. 2, pp 169-191 American Anthropological
Association, University of California Press
Barthes, Roland (1957 reprint: 2000) Mythologies trans. Johnathan Cape 1972,
Vintage, Random House UK
Brailovsky, Anna (1997) The Epic Tableau: Verfremdungseffekte in Anselm Kiefer's
Varus New German Critique, No. 71, Memories of Germany, pp. 115-138
Evans, Richard (2000). In Defence of History (Revised ed.). London: Granta Books.
pp. 256
Felsteiner, John.(1993) Paul Celan: Poet. .Survivor. Jew. New Haven: Yale
University Press
Heehs, Peter (1994) Myth, History and Theory in History and Theory, Vol. 33, No. 1
pp. 1-19
Mali, Joseph (1991) Joseph Burckhardt: Myth, History and Mythistory, in History &
Memory 3, pp86-113
McNeill, William H (1986) "Mythistory, or Truth, Myth, History and Historians," in
Journal of American Historical Review 91, pp 4- 8.
12
Rosenthal, Mark. (1987) Anselm Kiefier. Exhibition organised by A. James Speyer
and M Rosenthal. Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago
Rosenthal, Nan. (1999) Anselm Kiefer: Works on Paper in the Metropolitan Museum
of Art. New York Harry Abrams, Inc
Roos, Bonnie (2008) Anslem Kiefer and the Art of Allusion: Dialectics of the early
Margarete and Sulamith Paintings in Comparative Literature Vol. 58, 1 pp 24-51
University of Oregon
Saltzman, Lisa (1999) Anselm Kiefer and Art After Auschwitz. New York: Cambridge
University Press
Trommler, Frank (1989) Germany’s Past as an Artifact in Journal of Modern History,
Vol 61 no. 4 pp724- 735
White, Hayden (1973) Metahistory John Hopkins University Press, Maryland
White, Hayden (1990) The Content of the Form Baltimore Press ix-xi, 40-41
13