Dec 20

Dec 20 In Conversation with Berlin Based Art Dealer & Visionary — Johann König

On a cold September morning, I met with Johann König to talk about his book “Johann König Blinder Galerist,” a biography written together with Daniel Schreiber (Propyläen Verlag, Berlin 2019).

The warm light of the morning crossed the courtyard of St. Agnes, a former church in a concrete building from the 1960s built in the Brutalist style, which now houses the König Galerie. Suddenly, behind the gate that gives way to a desert courtyard, one crowd of working people after the other appeared. Like tiny robots, they went in and out of the buildings’ entrances. They were preparing an art fair. Large crates were lying everywhere in the office. Everything was in motion.

Johann König’s story struck me. He faced and overcame a very difficult experience about 25 years ago when an accident made him partially blind. But, above all, what amazed me is how he managed to mutate himself, how he emerged from this hardship to become a force for democratization and progress within the art world. A visionary offering new possibilities for future generations.

Cover image: Courtesy of König Galerie — Photo by Roman März

JK: Johann König
EO: Elda Oreto

EO: Sight has incredible value in our society. It is a lead player in the survival struggle of Western culture. I read that you say that despite having a flawed sight, your other senses are extremely developed. Could you tell us more about that?

JK: Yes, I think it’s actually about what we pay attention to. If you have a deficit in one of your senses, automatically, you try to fill that gap with other senses; to compensate or overcome this deficit. Then, naturally, you pay more attention to other inputs. They become more relevant out of necessity.

I’m going to explore these facts and to experiment through an exhibition that I’m currently curating as an independent curator in Amsterdam, in an art space called Het Hem, which is opening next spring. The exhibition will focus on experiencing art through different senses: seeing, feeling, hearing, touching, tasting, listening.

EO: This sensitiveness has dictated the way you live your life. In particular, it has shaped the way you present art to the public, which is also something you explore in your book. How can a drawback - be it considered physical, psychological, or linked to social contingencies - become an endowment?

JK: It’s always important to try to transform any type of energy, whether negative or alien; if you do not have equal chances, try to take this state as a challenge and transform these inequalities into something positive. Through your differences, you might discover true uniqueness. This can become your special ingredient, a way to differentiate yourself.

EO: In the book, right in the first pages, you talk about the French writer Jacques Lusseyran, who lived in the early half of the 1900s and who became blind due to an accident when he was eight years old. In his own book “And There Was Light,” he writes about his life, which turned out to be adventurous and unpredictable. He has not been defined by his limits. Indeed, he writes something that concerns each and any of us: “Joy does not come from the outside; it is within us, whatever happens to us. Light does not come from the outside, even if we have no eyes”. How are you and the French author alike, and how are you different?

JK: I would not dare to compare myself with him because he was a real hero. Despite his eyesight loss, he joined the Resistance, and he risked his life during WWII. I don’t think I can compare myself to him in any way. But the reason why I quoted him is that I liked to read him in boarding school. I was quite impressed by his memories, his writing on his state, and how he described the world as a blind person. I found it very inspiring.

EO: Another French writer, Albert Camus, wrote: “Existence is illusory or eternal.” Since life cannot be eternal, it will surely be a lie. One tries to put together the pieces, collected from the past. Thus, one writes to compensate for this loss. In my opinion, one writes for many reasons: for revenge, to resist the flow of all things, one writes to mend a tear but also to celebrate something or someone: what has driven you to write

JK: I wrote “Johann König Blinder Galerist” to overcome my accident. I only know it now, looking back. I didn’t know that at the beginning when I was writing. Somehow, it’s a bit like an outing, going public with something. Of course, my story was not a secret, but to stand up for what happened to me and not be secretive about it, in public, and not in a sensationalized way, was to overcome the accident almost 25 years after it happened.

EO: You said you wanted to be an artist before becoming a gallerist. You had an unconventional childhood: constantly impregnated with art and surrounded by artists. This thing could not fail to define your life. In the book, you talk about a sense of attraction but also repulsion towards this world. You dreamed of a “normal” childhood. You probably wanted to find your way. When you were a child, did you ever want to or imagine doing something completely outside of the art frame?

JK: I hated art when I was a kid. I really didn’t like art, and I wanted to be out of it. I had nothing to do with it. I started wanting to work with art only when my teenage years came around, and I got in contact with artists, and I studied more about it than in a didactic way in school.

EO: What did you want to do when you were a kid?

JK: Something where I could make money, like a business lawyer. Actually, I think in reality, more of an entrepreneur. I wanted to become an entrepreneur. I even started selling cell phones, cell phone contracts, and communication material. Then I started a small company at my boarding school where I used to sell phones.

EO: In your book, you also refer to your mother Edda Köchl-König, actress and illustrator. A creative and elegant woman, as you described. She left her career for you. She was with you before and after the accident, during the early days of the illness. The hardest time. How did she take your decision to become a gallery owner?

JK: She was very worried, I think, but supportive. That’s a very great thing about my parents: they have been very open. Even though at the beginning, I hid from my father that I opened the gallery, he was supportive. Same with my mother. I think she was really concerned, but she was very supportive.

EO: Your childhood ended the day of the accident. Perhaps even your life or rather the shape of your life stopped there. In the book, you describe the times of blindness. It is difficult for me to imagine that the successful man I am having a conversation with is the child described in those pages. You lived in Marburg at the institute for the blind. You slipped out of the ephemeral chaos of the art world. There you came back to life, learning to do everything again. To be a new person. Without a piece, maybe, but with many other qualities. What is the most important lesson you learned during that time?

JK: A lesson I learned during the time I spent in Marburg, which I’m not so sure I brought to the gallery, is that it’s important to share your deficits with similar people. It’s easier to overcome problems with people who share the same state. This is very valuable.

EO: After a year in Marburg to launch the art gallery, you got help directly and indirectly from your father and your uncle, Walter König, although you wanted to do things your way. Thanks to an operation in 2009 that greatly improved your sight, you changed again, becoming a gallerist. A new man, determined to accomplish great things. How would you describe this motivation that really drove you through your accident towards art, and through art to success?

JK: I just listened to an interesting podcast where a founder of a company said that he didn’t really notice he was growing this very big company. He always felt he was doing something like gaming, which was never a big thing for me. However, I liked this analogy of gaming as jumping from one level to the other. Taking the challenge. Moving on. And pushing it further. I think I would like to change the art world too, in this sense. Only now, looking back, I notice that I have tried to do this in many ways. For example, here, the gallery space in St. Agnes is very different from a traditional art space intended as a “white cube.” Also, we tried an experiment at the Art Berlin Fair: we showed the prices of the artworks on the label near each work. This is a way to play a bit for more transparency in the art world. There isn’t any reason why we should hide the prices.

Many collectors and also entrepreneurs who would like to become collectors, here, from the start-up scene in Berlin, don’t really dare to ask prices. They feel like they should know or that they have to keep thinking if they want to buy or whatever. To show the prices of the artworks is to lower the barrier of getting into art.

Jose Davila — Moment of Suspension, Courtesy of König Galerie — Photo by Roman März

EO: Today, König Galerie is a real institution, thanks to the will and effort that your wife, Lena, and yourself have invested in it. The gallery has grown in many ways. There are the headquarters in Berlin in the former church of St. Agnes, a location in London in Marylebone, and a new temporary gallery opening soon in Tokyo. Then there is König Souvenir, with objects designed by artists, along with König magazine. You have carried forward the desire to “democratize” art, bringing it into the life of more people. It seems to me that more than expanding your brand, you want to transform the system from the inside out. Is this so? What is your vision for the art system?

JK: I find it almost funny that I’m in a former church because I have never really liked the analogy between art and religion. However, at this point, I see myself as being almost a preacher with a mission in the world: trying to bring art into people’s lives. Art, for me, is a very important source of energy which enhances your quality of life. I want to share this with people. So, I try different things like organizing yoga classes in the exhibition space or have souvenirs created by artists to engage with a wider audience for König Souvenirs. It’s a challenge. It is like a Trojan Horse to either get people into the museum or to get art into their house, to further lead them to more challenging and intellectual discussions about art. It’s like harmless poisoned candies.

EO: Regarding this democratization of art, despite all efforts and good intentions, it seems to me that society is increasingly divided. On the one hand, those who can afford to do anything, and on the other, those to whom the law applies. How can art influence our future?

JK: It shouldn’t be like this, of course. I think that’s a big misunderstanding that I’m trying to fight against in my activities. This is the reason why it’s very important for the gallery to be free to visit, for example. It is also important for museums to be free two days a week in Berlin. Often you hear that art is a market only for the richest, people with private jets and billionaires, and so on. Of course, they’re involved. But think of the Tate galleries and the Hamburger Bahnhof in Berlin: those collections used to be private. Now anyone can enjoy them, and you own them as much as I do. They are public.

EO: I don’t want to be a spoiler here, but I do have to ask: are you already thinking about the next book? Can you tell us anything about that?

JK: I’m thinking about publishing a book on the art world because I learned that people are very curious about it. A sort of introduction to how the art world works. But I have to find time for this…

EO: If you had the power to travel through time, where would you go and during what time?

JK: I would go back to Paris one hundred years ago, so I could meet Pablo Picasso and Marcel Duchamp.

KÖNIG GALERIE brought a 3000 sq ft exhibition space for contemporary artists to Tokyo at the MCM GINZA HAUS I, the MCM’s Japanese flagship concept store. With a focus on showcasing a roster of key influential German, Austrian, and Swiss artists in Japan, the temporary gallery KÖNIG TOKIO runs multiple exhibitions starting from November 2019 through to December 2020.

A solo exhibition by photographer Juergen Teller formed the prelude of KÖNIG TOKIO. Titled Heimweh, the show explores the artist’s fairy tales and questions German clichés and traditions, with many of the works showing in public for the first time. Set up as an interplay between large-scale formats and smaller pictures, the exhibition runs from November 9th until January 2020.

www.koeniggalerie.com