Wolfgang Müller and the translation of Goethe's "Metamorphosen der Pflanzen" into Icelandic by Jon Atlason, published by the Walther von Goethe Foundation. Photo: Stefan Müller |
Preparing the Grüne Soße in the kitchen of Entretempo Kitchen Gallery. Photo: Stefan Müller |
How is Wolfgang Müller punk in 2015, you ask? It’s in the way he touches upon things, which manifests itself not only in his art work, but also when he talks. Wolfgang Müller likes to talk a lot and it can actually be considered to be an intrinsic part of his art work. At the dinner table, while eating Goethe’s mother’s grüne Soße deliciously prepared by Tainá Guedes, he was talking as the Director of the Walther von Goethe Foundation Reykjavik. While talking Wolfgang Müller manages to change the rhythm of things. This has to do with the way he touches upon a subject that has this certain corporeality, this fixated body to it (in this case “Johann Wolfgang von Goethe”). He cracks it open to a level that transcends this body so that a metamorphosis can take place - more in particular, in the head of the observer, slightly shifting beliefs, convictions and conventions that existed before. It can be seen on the faces of the dinner guests, changing during the evening from being amused to being confused and back again. Laughing is a most common reaction when things get out of one's control. The punkness of Wolfgang Müller is, as guest photographer Stefan Müller put it, “complete chaos and fun! As it should be.”
Literary Dining. Photo: Stefan Müller |
Müller’s private Goethe Institute itself metamorphosed, changing in the perception from being an art project to being a reality that attracted people like the Icelandic Ambassador. Finally the legal problems that followed this shift in perception made Müller change the name into the Walther von Goethe Foundation, named after the gay grandchild of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. Walther von Goethe was the last in line of the Goethes. Plenty of metamorphoses took place during the literary dining night at Entretempo Kitchen Gallery - me included. I was wearing Müller’s bird ring with the number 252 461. When I die, it has to be returned to the ornithological station of Helgoland together with my travel itinerary. Also here Müller touches upon the new rhythm that started in the 20th century when people became like birds, flying around all the time. And at the very end of this literary dining evening, we were all metamorphosed in such a way that we considered Johann Wolfgang von Goethe to be the proto-punk origin of punk history.
Wolfgang Müller displaying visual evidence. Photo: Stefan Müller |