Hans Haacke
Some of the themes in these works from the 1960s include the interactions of physical and biological systems, living animals, plants, and the states of water and the wind.
[6] The proposal was accepted, and Haacke prepared his installation, entitled MoMA Poll, but did not hand in the specific question until right before the opening of the show.
His query asked, "Would the fact that Governor Rockefeller has not denounced President Nixon's Indochina Policy be a reason for your not voting for him in November?"
[9] Haacke's question commented directly on the involvements of a major donor and board member at MOMA, Nelson Rockefeller.
[6][11][12] This cancellation is widely considered as a turning point in the relationship between artists and museums in the United States, where such cooperation became conflicted.
[3] Following the abrupt cancellation of his exhibition and the trouble it had caused with the museum, Haacke turned to other galleries, to Europe and his native country, where his work was more often accepted.
Ten years later he included the Shapolsky work—by then widely known—at his solo exhibition at the New Museum of Contemporary Art, entitled "Hans Haacke: Unfinished Business".
He requested the visitors fill out a questionnaire with 20 questions ranging from their personal demographic background information to opinions on social and political issues.
[6] In 1975, Haacke created a similar piece to the Manet project at the John Weber gallery in New York, exposing the history of ownership of Seurat's Models (Les Poseuses) (small version).
[6][13] In 1978, Haacke had a solo exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in Oxford, England, that included the new work A Breed Apart, which made explicit criticism of the state-owned British Leyland for exporting vehicles for police and military use to apartheid South Africa.
In 1982, at the documenta 7 exhibition, Haacke exhibited a very large work that included oil portraits of Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher in 19th-century style, facing on the opposite wall a gigantic photograph of the demonstration against nuclear arms held earlier that year—the largest demonstration in Germany since the end of the Second World War.
The clear implication, supported by Haacke's remarks, was that these two figures were attempting to roll back their respective nations to the socially and politically regressive, laissez-faire, and imperialist policies of the 19th century.
[14] Haacke has had solo exhibitions since, at the New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York; the Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven; and the Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris.
In 1993, looking through the doors of the pavilion, past the broken floor, the viewer witnesses the word on the wall: "Germania", Hitler's name for Nazi Berlin.
[15] In 2000, the permanent installation DER BEVÖLKERUNG (To the Population) was inaugurated in the Reichstag, the German Parliament building in Berlin, and in 2006, a public commission commemorating Rosa Luxemburg was completed in a three-block area in the center of the city.
Burnham also points to Haacke's joining the Arts Workers Coalition and the boycott of the São Paulo Bienal in Brazil in 1969 as catalyst for the artist's work to take a political direction.
[6] Writing by Haacke and his close friends and colleagues, including documentation of his work, are collected in two separate books by the artist.
