The installations by Swiss-born artist Thomas Hirschhorn, often take social and political injustices as their theme; they are not easily consumed. On view are diverse objects of everyday use and technical apparatus, storefront mannequins, magazines, books or porn magazines, bound or glued together. Although Hirschhorn regards his creative anarchy as a critique of capitalistic commodification, it seems to fit the art market’s laws, because he is one of the world’s commercially most successful installation artists.

Hirschhorn garners this great attention for his art less by staging his own person than by accurately targeting social contexts. The best-known and most controversial discussion was probably about his Bataille Monument, his contribution to the documenta XI in the Friedrich Wöhler Settlement in northeastern Kassel. Why an homage to a French philosopher in surroundings regarded as socially problematic? To the many neighbors who worked on Hirschhorn’s project, it was a fascinating social experience, even if the “ontological cinema” was sometimes announced as “ornithological cinema”. But Hirschhorn does not regard himself as a social worker. He himself proclaims that his art is not interactive in the physical sense, but aims to stimulate mental processes. The artist relies on viewers who will delve seriously into the philosophical and historical references in his works. Sometimes the market is content with their successfully trashy look.

Thomas Hirschhorn, born in Bern in 1957, lives in Paris. Not only has he drawn worldwide attention with his installations and street altars, he also achieved fame through an act of provincial censorship, when the Swiss National Council cut the budget of the Pro Helvetia Cultural Foundation because the latter had supported an undesired exhibition of Hirschhorn’s work.