Die Bedeutung der Bildenden Kunst für die Akademie
Von Markus Lüpertz, den die Akademie 2017 anlässlich des Jubiläums „60 Jahre Katholische Akademie Bayern“ zu einem Gespräch mit Bischof Friedhelm Hofmann nach Schweinfurt ins Museum Georg Schäfer eingeladen hatte, stammt der Satz, „dass die Kirche nicht nur ein sozialer, den Psychologen ersetzender Hilfsverein ist, sondern, dass sie eine große, gigantische kulturelle Verantwortung hat“.
Since its foundation, the Academy has felt particularly committed to this responsibility towards the fine arts and has repeatedly addressed questions about art. For example, one of its very first conferences in November 1957 was entitled "Where does art stand today? One of the speakers at that time was Georg Meistermann, who also received the Romano Guardini Prize of the Catholic Academy in Bavaria in 1984.
In addition, more than 120 exhibitions have been held in the Kardinal Wendel Haus, including - a special concern of the Academy - sensational exhibitions with students from the Academy classes of the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich and Nuremberg. Here are just a few examples: the Jerry Zeniuk class - who, incidentally, painted the altarpiece in the chapel - the Stephan Huber class, the Magdalena Jetelová class and the Jorinde Voigt class. And an exhibition with the class of Anke Doberauer is planned for 2024.
In order to be able to maintain a clear level of exhibitions, the Catholic Academy of Bavaria has assembled a committee of proven experts since 2002. The declared aim is to hold one or two exhibitions per year. The park, chapel (to a reduced extent), and above all the rooms and foyers of the Kardinal Wendel Haus are to be temporarily conquered by art, while at the same time proving to be integrable into the normal conference business due to practical requirements and constraints, without irritations being faded out.
Apart from high quality, the selection criteria are above all those works in which - as difficult as this may be to justify rationally - the emergence of spirituality, a sense of transcendence, radical openness or even direct religious impulses can be experienced.
Kunstwerke in der Akademie
In addition to the regular presentation of works by contemporary artists, a not inconsiderable number of artworks have found their way permanently into the Academy, whether they have been acquired, donated or loaned to it. Only the smaller part of these have a permanent place and are exhibited.
One work is worth mentioning, as it was given to the Academy as a birth gift, so to speak, with the construction of the Kardinal Wendel Haus in 1962: On the north façade of the Cardinal Wendel House, the visitor is greeted by the almost 25-metre-long monumental relief "Vom Chaos zur Ordnung" (From Chaos to Order) by the artist Blasius Gerg (1927 - 2007), who came from Glonn. Gerg always held back on interpreting his work. "Everything that needs to be said is expressed in the title," he told the Academy in a telephone conversation in 1995. And indeed, the relief is self-explanatory: just as man moves from disorder to order by building and joining jumbled stones, so he moves from chaos to the cross by being far or near it. From chaos to order - a demanding but apt motif for academy work.
Arts Committee
Um niveauvolle Ausstellungen präsentieren zu können, hat die Katholische Akademie unter der Leitung von Akademiedirektor a.D. Dr. Florian Schuller seit 2002 ein kleines Gremium von ausgewiesenen Fachleuten zusammengestellt.
Dieses trifft sich regelmäßig und berät die Akademie in Fragen der bildenden Kunst. Erklärtes Ziel ist es, drei bis vier Ausstellungen pro Jahr durchzuführen. Dabei sollen Park, Kapelle und das Kardinal Wendel Haus für die Kunst entdeckt und ganz bewusst auch Irritationen hervorgerufen werden.
Letztendlich geht es darum, die Essenz der Kunstwerke – womöglich auch eine Ahnung von Transzendenz – im Austausch mit den Künstlern und mit den Besuchern der Akademie zu eruieren.
