Preparation photo from Rivane Neuenschwander, I wish your wish, 2003, at the Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh (Photo courtesy CMoA’s Flickr stream)

Every four years, the Carnegie Museum of Art in my hometown of Pittsburgh, PA, hosts a huge exhibition that takes over most a large part of the art museum in order to showcase what they consider the best contemporary art today.

I visited the CI08 on Tuesday and have to say that I was a little less than impressed, although there are some standout pieces that really made the exhibition for me. Perhaps the reason why I liked it less was because at the last Carnegie International (04-05), I was drawn to a greater number of the works, and even remember a lot of those works much more vividly than I realized as a friend and I went through this year’s show. There are a few things that I think took away from the International this year, and I’ll talk about them below, along with some of the pieces I really loved.

The Theme

I see where they’re going with the theme of “Life on Mars”, but what first comes to my mind is aliens and sci-fi. Of course, when you read the explanation, the intention becomes clear: “Are we alone in the universe? Do aliens exist? Or are we, ourselves, the strangers in our own worlds? We are not alone.” The idea of looking at our culture from the viewpoint of an utter outsider is intriguing, but I wish there was a way to take away the odd, almost humorous connotations that I get immediately — which quickly disappear after you read that introduction.

The Selection

Simply put, there are a LOT of German artists. I have nothing against German artists (my favorite artist of all time is Albrecht Durer), but for an exhibition that prides itself on being — obviously — “international” and representing many countries, I was surprised at their choice of artists. Eight of the forty-one artists are from Germany, and an additional four more work in Germany (but weren’t born there). A handful of others are from Austria or Switzerland, and almost all of the rest, except for seven, are American or British. As we walked through the galleries, it seemed like every room had at least one German artist in it — same with American or British.

Again, nothing against the artists they chose; but why weren’t there more Asian artists? Not just Chinese or Japanese, but from the middle eastern countries? Or South America (I believe there’s only one)? One glance at the advisory committee for CI08 seems to hint as to why this happened (click here and scroll down). Half of the committee, which comprises only four members, work at contemporary art museums or centers in Frankfurt, Germany; the other two work at the New Museum in New York City. I won’t say any more on this topic, since I hate being negative — but I will say that I think the previous International did a much better job of having artists from much more diverse places.

The Standouts

There were two works that, walking out of the doors of the museum, I knew would stick in my mind for a long time. Each, in a very different way, rely on viewer interactions to get their message across.

Preparation photo from Thomas Hirschhorn, Cavemanman, 2002, at the Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh (Photo courtesy CMoA’s Flickr stream)

Thomas Hirschhorn’s Cavemanman installation (right) was utterly engrossing and extremely powerful. As my friend and I decided, this is the way installation art should be done. This series of huge rooms made of brown packaging tape, cardboard, and found materials engulfs you in the dull quiet of a huge, multi-room cardboard box fort. Your footsteps stick to the tape on the floor as you wander through the utterly still, unechoing spaces that Hirschhorn has created, among discarded soda cans that litter the floor, past groups of tinfoil people attached to dynamite and political books, through rooms with photographs, graffiti, and clocks on the cardboard walls. Don’t bother trying to decipher the guide; instead, develop your own opinion of why Hirschhorn would invite us into this near-post-apocolyptic space of images and words from our own culture.

Rivane Neuenschwander’s I wish your wish (2003) is a much more optimistic work, where you take a ribbon with a wish imprinted on it, sometimes in English, sometimes not — a wonderful nod to the “international” in the title, whether or not the artist intended it — and then tie the ribbon around your wrist (or where ever) and when it falls off, the wish comes true.

Preparation photo from Rivane Neuenschwander, I wish your wish, 2003, at the Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh (Photo courtesy CMoA’s Flickr stream)

In return, you leave a wish in the hole in the wall, which might be turned into a wish itself. My friend and I ended our tour of the exhibition here, and it was a wonderful way to end a thought-provoking day at the museum. It’s a lovely way to “give back” and really feel like you’re participating in a work of art.

Also, kudos to the CMoA for a technologically-friendly exhibition website: incorporating thoughts from the blogosphere and even using tagging features, the website is much more fancy and interactive than one might expect from a large museum, showing that the curators really wanted to try to connect this exhibition to an ever-more-technologically-savvy audience. They even have a Flickr photostream of images from installing the exhibition, from which I borrowed the images in this post — absolutely fantastic.

To end, I want to note that not only the friend with whom I went to see the exhibition, but a lot of the people I’ve talked to about CI08 have really loved the show. In fact, many like it better than the last one — so go figure! The only way to really decide for yourself is, naturally, to get to the Carnegie sometime this year, and check out the exhibition for yourself (and then tell us about it here). Like both of the Internationals I’ve been to, it’s certainly sparked discussions and many thoughts about art and the world between me and my friends — which I think, regardless of the problems I do have with it, makes it, as usual, a success.

Life on Mars: The 2008 Carnegie International | Now through January 11, 2009 | The Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh, PA.