PORTFOLIO_KLAUS_HU_selection 2013 _ 2022

a memory of the future
and a precognition of the prehistoric
Have I recently posed questions about landscape, land-
use, resources, the digital archive and citation, narration
and abstraction in painting, so I simply open the canon
in HI ALTITUDE 2019 21 on where to, why, and what
remains similar (despite diﬀerent preconditions and
technological so called progress). Its an abyss of
narrative ambiguities, that connect disparate time
frames, locations, rituals and metaphors, connected as
nonlinear visual representations. It could easily be seen
as a time bomb exploded, if there would not be the
questions: where to, why, and what remains similar?
preview / in progress
> https://klaushu.blogspot.com/2015/01/hi-altitude-2019-21.html

artist statement
KLAUS HU works in painting refer to photographic archives,
and the work series per year rely on subjects, that tangle:
1: strata / geology / genealogy
2: the digital / the sensual / appropriation
3: landscape / land-use / conflicts on resources
4: escapism / sci-fi and narrative territories
among others.
KLAUS HU wants to claim focus on the “source” of inspiration with juxtapositions
in the exhibition space, to form a visual narrative among the works shown
and its evolving discourse.

at Villa Heike / Berlin
opening:
thursday 16th June 5 - 10 pm
runs from
16th June till 5th of July 2022
open times
wed - sun 2 - 8 pm
exhibition

HI ALTITUDE 2019 21
BY KLAUS HU
a memory of the future
and a precognition of the prehistoric.
painting / collage / fact & fiction
Painting, that re-connects the wired digital brain with geographical distant
features, locations and rituals. Who would deny, that the genome editing
process, abandoned bombing test sites or the astronauts space capsule are not so
different from the fire and its shadows inside the prehistoric cave. Landscape,
figuration and abstraction do mingle in the new series of paintings by Klaus Hu,
based on recycled drawings and collages. Shown are distant landscapes and
prehistoric geoglyphs. Are the images a premonition or do they represent a
memory? A momentum of standstill or signs of restart? Contrasted in the exhibition
space of Villa Heike, painting becomes a narrative refuge as shelter and the stage of
multiple references and geographies
The paintings, graphites and collages developed from 2019 to 2021
will be first shown from 16th June 2022 till 5th of July 2022 in Berlin at Villa Heike.
@villaheike.berlin
works: https://klaushu.blogspot.com/2015/01/hi-altitude-2019-21.html
Villa Heike, Freienwalder Str. 17, 13055 Berlin, Hohenschönhausen

1
2
3
4 - 6
7 - 9 10
11
12
13
14
1 JOSHUA TREE_S
oil on canvas, 160 x 200 cm
2 AFTER THE CLOUD_green deal
3 NAZCA I - V
graphite, chalk, black wood stain on bristol 250 g
each 70 x 100 cm, each framed 80 x 110, ensemble of 5
4 NESSUNO VIA
diptych, oil on canvas 80 x 140 cm
5 / 6 CAVE I + II
oil on canvas, each 40 x 55 cm
7 NO MILK TODAY
oil on canvas, diptych, 80 x 140 cm
8 / 9 GOOGLE / CLIMATE ?
oil on canvas, each 40 x 55 cm
10 FOR YOU AND ME
triptych, oil on canvas, 200 x 480 cm
11 DAKAR_windswept
12 GRAB A BOARD !
mixed media, oil on bristol 250 g
70 x 100 cm, framed 80 x 110 cm
13 BENNU_RYUGU
oil, charcoal graphite on bristol 250 g
70 x 100 cm, framed 80 x 110 cm
14 recycled drawings as collages
different formats
all works © KLAUS HU 2019 21
& VG BILD-KUNST BONN 2022
prices & pricelist of works available on request
KLAUS HU / HI ALTITUDE 2019 21 at VILLA HEIKE 2022
contact: KLAUS HU / STUDIO KLAUS HU email: klaushu@yahoo.de homepage: klaushu.blogspot.com

JOSHUA TREE_S, oil on canvas_160 x 200 cm
© KLAUS HU _ STUDIO KLAUS HU 2019_21 & VG BILD-KUNST BONN

oil on canvas 160 x 200 cm
© KLAUS HU 2019 / 21
& VG BILD-KUNST BONN
could as well be installed in a ZEN
monastery, as well as in a baroque
castle full of historical artefacts.
Landscape as longing, and here
especially as a truly Californian
desert landscape resembles a state
of mind, that seems both empty and
full. As I have experienced this
state of vast space myself, although
only in a glimpse of duration, this
painting may spark its unrest or
silence if requested. Its collage
style of the Joshua Tree that has
named a landscape and vice versa,
is a true flower / plant re-
presentation how branches of
galaxies are seen by Hubbles
telescope.
So there is the question, how / if organic life on earth resembles larger
structures in the macrocosm of the universe. This cannot be
deciphered via theory, via chemical alchemy or via space exploration.
This may only be explored via metaphorical and metaphysical
speculation.
JOSHUA TREE / S

AFTER THE CLOUD_green deal, oil on canvas_160 x 200 cm

AFTER THE
CLOUD_ green deal
© KLAUS HU 2019 / 21
A precognition of the prehistoric and a
memory of the future, how lockdown /
pandemic and climate crisis, including
over use of resources may be
interwoven. Is landscape a historical
or a contemporary quest for reflection?
Is it of solitude, or ist it of spiritual
freedom? An ongoing economic and
political crisis for exploitation? My
own 2 / 4 hands focus on this gap
between this condition inside the
prehistoric cave and the astronauts
space cabin. Its not an easy ride. Its a
jump into unknown territory.

composed of Nazca
features, resembling
large geoglyphs made in
the soil of the Nazca
Desert in southern Peru.
They were created
between 500 BCE and
500 CE by people
making depressions or
shallow incisions in the
desert floor, removing
pebbles and leaving
differently colored dirt
exposed. Juxtaposed
here with features /
petroglyphs discovered
in caves of Spain /
Altamira and Lascaux /
France. Sometimes
contemporary bombing
test ranges resemble
geoglyphs....
graphite chalk
black wood stain on bristol 250 g
each 80 x 110 cm
ensemble 320 x 110 cm
© KLAUS HU 2019 / 21
NAZCA I - IV
composed of Nazca
features, resembling
large geoglyphs made in
the soil of the Nazca
Desert in southern Peru.
They were created
between 500 BCE and
500 CE by people
making depressions or
shallow incisions in the
desert floor, removing
pebbles and leaving
differently colored dirt
exposed. Juxtaposed
here with features /
petroglyphs discovered
in caves of Spain /
Altamira and Lascaux /
France. Sometimes
contemporary bombing
test ranges resemble
geoglyphs....
graphite chalk
black wood stain on bristol 250 g
each 80 x 110 cm
ensemble 320 x 110 cm
© KLAUS HU 2019 / 21
NAZCA I - IV

NESSUNO VIA diptych, oil on canvas 80 x 140 cm © KLAUS HU 2019 & VG BILD-KUNST BONN

The spider catches my eye
Stretched in the Desert
For performative reasons
Cleansing the White clay
Of its umber Reddish rocks
Orange filled, blinded by the Sun
The same effect as in deep time - Blue
Loss of control and of reference
NESSUNO VIA
(no one away) (niemand weg)
diptych / oil on canvas 80 x 140 cm
nessuno è andato / niemand ist weg /
niemand ist gegangen / no one´s gone
nessuno vai / niemand geht /
no one go / nessuno va / nobody goes
vai via / geh weg / go away
nessuno se ne sta andando /
niemand geht / no one is leaving
© KLAUS HU 2019 / 21
Vanishing Blue
Painted Blind
As Dusk covers the Studio
Mixing Blue and Black
Yellow net of the stars
Distant space
Deep Time
Without perspective and scale
Myriads

diptych oil on canvas
100 x 160 cm
© KLAUS HU 2019 / 21
based on news paper
clipping of ecological
disaster and human
misconduct.
NO MILK TODAY

GOOGLE /
CLIMATE
oil on canvas each 40 x 55 cm
© KLAUS HU 2019 / 21
Indigenous land rights and climate wars will
follow?

MORNING GLORY
oil on canvas_100 x 70 cm
© KLAUS HU
STUDIO KLAUS HU 2019_21

FOR YOU AND ME
triptych, oil on canvas 200 x 480 cm © STUDIO KLAUS HU 2021 & VG BILD-KUNST BONN

FOR YOU AND ME
Is there a sense of freedom while color surrounds the body? Or is it the action of applying paint
in a slow process? Speed and slowness are relative. So are memory and precognition.
A presentiment of what has already happened in time to come
and what may happen again in a cycle remembered...
oil on canvas each 200 x 160 cm, triptych 200 x 480 cm © KLAUS HU 2019 / 21 & VG BILD-KUNST BONN

GRAB A BOARD !the water ́s fine !
mixed media / oil on bristol 250 g
80 x 110 cm
© KLAUS HU 2019 / 21
As in May 2019, there came this NY times article to my mind: “Get ready for baobab
smoothies” and “Grab a board, the wateŕs great”, when there was no pandemic, and
travel and exploration seemed not only a luxury for the wealthy. Now in 2021 with
travel restrictions and amid lack of vaccines not only locally but globally, and further
spread of a virus, I have no clue, how images, my mind and staying at home may lead
to inspiration. Ím not a fan of ZOOM, nor classic telephone friending, so this painting
remains, urging for destinations for local and cosmopolitan experience, after the
pandemic has been mastered. After. We ́re still in it. Thats the fact. So, any news,
despite the common sense? or just Studio time and staying at home?
In memoriam John Baldessari.
DAKAR_windswept
© KLAUS HU 2019 / 21

DAKAR_windswept, oil on canvas_160 x 200 cm

BENNU_RYUGU
oil, charcoal graphite on bristol 250 g
80 x 110 cm
© KLAUS HU 2019 / 21

collages on paper, ensemble
diﬀerent sizes
approx. each 29, 5 x 42 cm, 70 x 100 cm
© KLAUS HU 2019

proposal for
HEIDELBERG
anthropological museum
2020
(the corona version)

poetic intervention
AFTER THE CLOUD_green deal
© KLAUS HU _ STUDIO KLAUS HU 2019_21
MORNING GLORY
Anthropological Museum
Heidelberg / Germany
proposal 2020

poetic intervention
DAKAR_windswept

proposal for
LOS ANGELES
Billboard Creative 2021
public / outdoor

proposal for LOS ANGELES Billboard Creative 2021 / public / outdoor
proposal for LOS ANGELES Billboard Creative 2021 / public / outdoor

A KIND OF BLUE
KLAUS HU 2016 / 17
refines one color as the main subject
for narrative and abstract responses
on daily / subjective and on geopolitical issues

HOME-I-AM
oil on canvas 145 x 280 cm © KLAUS HU 2017

Im Feld der Erinnerung
Neun Landschaften
Nachtlandschaften - eine Sternenkarte
die Ausrichtung der Pueblos
die Steine - Wegweiser zu den Sternen
wie moderne Strassenkreuze
Landkarte der Ahnen / Götter / Geister
das Wesen der Anfänge
Beginn des Lebens - alles nur ein Wegweiser
kosmische Zyklen der Zeit und des Raumes
der sich selbst ausdehnt
entstand mit der Materie
Handlungsanweisungen für zukünftige Sternenfahrer
oder intelligente Wesen, die uns besuchen
Zeugnisse einer Verbindung
wie der Bär der Kwaikutl
lernt, mit den Ahnen / Geistern um die Wette zu laufen
sonst droht alles in der Beschleunigung zu implodieren
Die Sternenkarten / Steine sind Sprache
so wie Beuys Recht hatte
40 Jahre später
welch verschwindender Zeitraum!
radioaktiver Abfall der nächsten 100.000 Jahre
welch verschwindender Zeitraum!
Die Zeit im Rückspiegel.
Inside field of memory
Nine landscapes
Night scapes - a star map
The orientation of the pueblos
The stones - signposting to the stars
Such as modern street crosses
Map of the ancestors / gods / spirits
The essence of the beginning
Beginning of life - everything only a signpost
Cosmic cycles of time and space
Which stretches itself
Originated with matter
Instructions for future star travellers
Or intelligent beings who visit us
Testimonies of a signal
Like the bear of the Kwaikutl
Who learns to run with its ancestors / spirits
Otherwise, everything threatens to implode by
acceleration
The stars / stones are language
As Beuys stated rightfully
40 years later
What a tiny timescale!
Radioactive waste of the next 100,000 years
What a tiny timescale!
Time inside rear mirror.

KLAUS HU
STRIPES 2015 / 16
WORKS / selection

content book
STRIPES 2015 / 16
NOT EVERY LANDSCAPE IS OF CAPITAL MEANS 2013 / 15
HOW TO TRANSCEND A POOL IN SPACE 2014 / 15
THE ROSETTA EARTH PROJECT 2012 / 13
NEW MEXICAN TRAVELS 2013
LES HETEROTOPIES 2011 / 12
NY 92 / 12 2012
MARS 2009 / 12
DESERT 2007 / 8
BEACH 2006

EUROPA oil on canvas 195 x 270 cm © Klaus Hu 2010 / 15 / 16

The colored squares of EUROPA
Memory and matter. Site and territory. Identity and reflection. Political clashes and imbalances.
Immigration and rising new nationalisms. Color field painting has not the intention to reflect on
political issues, the same can be said about representational painting. Digital acceleration forces
painting into a mere backdrop of decoration. Subjects, whether as reflection on the painting process,
whether as philosophical or/and political reflection seem to be anachronistic in the fast pace of the
market place. The squared territory. No media news cover currently, what is happening from its
neighbors perspective within. EUROPA as a map is intended as a zone of free economic trade,
without empathy of diﬀerences and imbalances. EUROPA as a mental map of memory and of its
contemporary history simplifies the current situation. The Sublime as color on the canvas here refers
in its duration to its own cause.
Die eingefärbten Gebiete von EUROPA
Gedächtnis und Materie. Ort und Territorium. Identität und Reflexion. Politische
Auseinandersetzungen und Ungleichgewichte. Immigration und aufkommende neue Nationalismen.
Farbfeldmalerei hat nicht die Absicht über politische Themen zu reflektieren. Das Gleiche kann auch
über die gegenständliche Malerei gesagt werden. Digitale Beschleunigungskräfte zwingen die
Malerei in eine bloße Kulisse der Dekoration. Themen, seien es Reflexionen über den Malprozess,
seien es philosophische oder / und politische Reflexionen, scheinen im schnellen Lauf des
Marktplatzes anachronistisch zu sein. Das geteilte Gebiet. Keine Medien Nachrichten berichten
derzeit, was aus der Perspektive seiner Nachbarn geschieht. EUROPA als Karte, ist als Zone des
freien Wirtschaftshandels geplant, ohne Empathie für die Unterschiede und Ungleichgewichte (ihrer
Protagonisten). EUROPA als mentale Karte des Gedächtnisses und der Zeitgeschichte vereinfacht
die gegenwärtige Situation. Das Erhabene als Farbe auf der Leinwand bezieht sich hier in seiner
Dauer auf seine eigene Ursache.

YELLOW JAZZ oil on canvas 140 x 240 cm diptych © Klaus Hu 2015 / 16

Edward S Curtis 1868-1952
Frame of peyote sweat-lodge
1 photogravure :
brown ink ; 14 x 19 cm [image size],
18 x 22 cm [plate size]
Original photogravure produced
in Cambridge, MA,
by Suffolk Engraving Co.
1927
Source
The North American Indian (1907-1930)
v.19, The Indians of Oklahoma.
The Wichita. The southern Cheyenne.
The Oto. The Comanche.
The Peyote cult ([Seattle] : E.S. Curtis ;
[Cambridge, Mass. :
The University Press], 1930),
Facing page 206
Northwestern University
Digital Library Collections
Edward S. Curtis. The North American Indian (1907-1930)
This publication follows the nineteenth-century Euro-American tradition of capturing the “otherness” of indigenous American Indian life in
photography and narrative chronicles. It is set apart by its ambitious scale, and by the striking effect of its images, which are essentially contrived
reconstructions rather than true documentation. Originally planned for five years, the complicated project was slowed by prohibitive expenses. Public
reception was mixed. Less than half of 500 projected sets were printed. Scholars, while interested in staff notes on vocabulary and lore, were dubious of
Curtis’s methods of observation. In the 1970s the photographs began to enjoy a nostalgic revival in reprints, and have had a lasting, if controversial,
influence on views of the American Indian. page: curtis.library.northwestern.edu/site_curtis/

some random thoughts inside my studio on STRIPES
KLAUS HU 2015 / 16
"The Americans" 1959 and later "The Lines of My Hands" by Robert Frank denoted the autobiographical subject
view on (American) reality of the late 50´s and of the early and late 60´s.
Today, we are haunted by the digital collisions of layers of information, followed by voids of amnesia. The
contemplation needed for abstraction and reflection is replaced by accelerated speed and overloads of images
and gaps of white bleak time.
Stripes, lines and dots are the basic visual (and mathematical) elements, which refer to writing and drawing (at
the wall of the pre-historic cave). As we dive into an overall NOW, using multiple references, instead of single
signals, the digital archive seems to have replaced experience as we have known it before.
Painting with its system of reflection and debate is replaced by media statements across simultaneous channels.
The painting process as contemplation is restrained by this expanded time continuum of presence and its 120
character twitter message.
Even references to writers and philosophers seem lost in the digital stream. Jasper Johns has foreseen in his
White Flags series of 1969 ( a statement also against the Vietnam war ) this white field of white noise as white
stripes.
Location, so much in use by Stephen Shore in his early photographs of street crossings, is replaced by empty
signifiers, bubbles and hash tags.
The diﬀerence and the clash between the digital and the abstraction of the painting process is exemplified here
in a series of works, that also act as empty signifiers of the art markets monetary evaluation.
work in progress

AIR_STRIP (deplaned after 5 PM) oil on canvas 120 x 140 cm © KLAUS HU 2015

SHORE_LINES (after 5 PM) oil on canvas 120 x 140 cm © KLAUS HU 2015

STRIPES ensemble oil on canvas 240 x 280 cm © KLAUS HU 2015 16
STRIPES ensemble oil on canvas 240 x 280 cm © KLAUS HU 2015 16

KLAUS HU
UNSETTLED LANDSCAPES 2013 / 15
WORKS / selection

Unsettled Landscapes
ON LANDSCAPE AND ITS CONFLICTS
Research has been made possible during residency at Santa Fe Art Institute in New Mexico / USA
in March / April 2013.
The landscape of the North American South West appears as an ambient room as visual language
of lived time. As visual translation, these opposites merge into a symbiosis. Do I imagine landscape
or does landscape reflect on me? Is landscape a romantic topic of escape, "inspired" by infinity or is
it an ecological disaster? While landscape was subject to the will and spirit of the late baroque
period in European tradition and degraded to geometric alignments of the nobility, the romantic
period of the 19th century projected the "soul" of the author / artist on / into the canvas, and thus
into / onto the real landscape. Sometimes landscape disappeared as a longing as in Caspar David
Friedrich´s paintings. At the beginning of the 20th Century modernity opens the bridge to non-
western traditions, without examining in detail the various notions of landscape, the self, the
projection, the ritual and transformation. Only the ignition of the first Atomic bomb in 1945 in New
Mexico threw an image on the dichotomy of dissolution versus unity (of the self). The result was the
counter-movement and the awakening of the 60's generation. But everything vanished into a
daydream. Another 40 years later, after several financial and ecological crises and disasters, the
exploitation of resources by transnational corporations, wars of intervention, after 9/11, looking at
"LANDSCAPE" is probably a marginal subject. While land-art of the 60's in America was dependent
(and still is - see Michael Heizer) of immense production budgets of the Foundations, landscape
submerged as backdrop into the popular context.

project 1
NOT EVERY LANDSCAPE IS OF CAPITAL MEANS
(but without means there is no property)
concept for a wall size installation
photography © KLAUS HU 2013/15
As the film of John Ford "The Searchers"
with its cliché of John Wayne´s
male role model is still existent to some degree,!
the real landscape of the American Southwest and its land-rights and property
policy is still based on treaties and negotiations
of the 19th century and its civil war.!
How is landscape abused today with its property and sales management?
How has property management failed and led financial speculation into current crisis
of land, land-use and property?
A photographic wall size installation of photos recorded at first nation reservation of
Acoma and at the town of Madrid in New Mexico during 2013,
to be installed as a wall size installation minimum 200 x 600 cm,
combining pigment print on high resolution paper with projection
and other materials.

CHURCH ROCK: THE SILENCE SURROUNDING AMERICA'S WORST NUCLEAR ACCIDENT
James Reich September 9, 2013
The horror tonight is that it could get much worse. The potential is there for the ultimate risk of meltdown at
Three Mile Island. Almost thirty-five years have elapsed since Walter Cronkite delivered those baleful lines to
the CBS cameras in 1979, describing the only domestic nuclear accident with sustained popular recognition
in the United States. Next year, four months after the Three Mile Island anniversary, July 16 will mark thirty-
five years since the Church Rock uranium mine spill, a greater catastrophe that remains relatively unknown,
even within my adopted home state of New Mexico where it occurred. July 16 is also the date of the first
explosion of a nuclear device, the Trinity test in New Mexico, 1945. Church Rock is the most significant of
America's silent nuclear accidents: it released more radiation than Three Mile Island (43 curies, compared
with 16). However, the nuclear industry is extremely effective at concealing its litany of leaks, fires, ruptures,
shutdowns, human error, seismic and meteorological threats, from coast to coast, Indian Point to Diablo
Canyon. At Church Rock, cracks had been observed in the containment wall of one of United Nuclear
Corporation's lagoons a week before its failure. As Prof. Doug Brugge reported, the six-meter breach spilled
1100 tons of radioactive mill waste and 95 million gallons of mine process effluent down Pipeline Arroyo and
into the North Fork of the Puerco River. This tremendous flow of water backed up sewers, affected 2 nearby
aquifers, left pools along the river, and transported contaminants 130 km downstream to a point near Navajo,
Arizona.
In July, in Santa Fe, protests continued against the proposed reopening and development of uranium-mining
sites in New Mexico. In 2011, the EPA described 500 abandoned uranium mines in the state, and hundreds of
square miles contaminated by the process. The dangers of radium, radon gas and uranium to those exposed
and contaminated communities include chronic lung disease and cancer, bone and cranial tumors, necrosis of
the jaw, acute leukopenia, anemia, lymphatic and hematopoietic tumors.
Further objections are raised on the grounds that uranium-mining operations desecrate land sacred to Native
Americans from Acoma Pueblo, Laguna Pueblo and the Navajo Nation, including the Mount Taylor region,
where a Canadian-Japanese company Roca Honda Resources has submitted plans to mine. I have seen the
argument that religious objections have no place in such decision-making. As an atheist, I agree, but one does
not require a religious basis or a perception of certain lands being sacrosanct to certain peoples to object to
these plans, merely the reasonable concern for public health and the environment. That being said, rumors of
the separation of Church and State in American practice have been greatly exaggerated. And from
exaggeration to silence: arguably, the relative invisibility of the Church Rock spill, compared with Three Mile
Island, is in relation to the relative invisibility of the indigenous communities affected by the disaster.
Strathmore Minerals Corporation (60% of Roca Honda Resources) has obtained the Church Rock site and
will begin mining this year. Strathmore and Roca Honda Resources expect to extract tens of millions of pounds
of uranium from their operations, from which it is reasonable to state that there will be an accumulation of
contaminated waste in proportion. Uranium extraction in New Mexico is also emblematic of the primacy of
corporatism over communities, particularly the indigenous or marginalized. The nuclear industry,
corporatism, is engaged in a slow holocaust. Arguments for uranium mining based upon employment
opportunities for impoverished communities are specious. State and Federal government should prevent this
devastating technology.
It is inevitable that more regions of the nation will have to be permanently abandoned as a result of
catastrophes like Church Rock, or Sequoyah Fuels Corporation in Oklahoma, or near-disastrous reactor
incidents like those at Three Mile Island, Browns Ferry AL, Waterford CT, Nine Mile Point NY, Oak Harbor
OH, Wiscasset ME, Braidwood IL, Vernon VT, to refer to a few. Nuclear power is not, in any sense, a clean
technology, nor is nuclear power a justifiable alternative, with its constant threat to life. The American people
are engaged in a game of Russian roulette with these facilities, often without even being aware that they are
playing. There is no return to the scene of a nuclear accident or serious radioactive contamination, hence the
exclusion zones at Chernobyl, Fukushima, and the restrictions surrounding Hanford, WA. The greatest danger
to our nuclear facilities is not terrorism, but time, decay, accidents, and coincidence.
James Reich is the author of Bombshell: A Novel (Soft Skull Press, July 2013) and I, Judas: A Novel (Soft
Skull Press, October 2011). He is a contributing faculty member at Santa Fe University of Art and Design.
archival images courtesy GOOGLE EARTH & CLUI (CENTER FOR LAND USE INTERPRETATION

WHITE SANDS I - III
3 charcoals on Stonehenge / each 93,2 x 123,9 cm
total: 297 cm x 123,9 cm
© KLAUS HU 2013
based on a photographic research trip to Bandelier
National Monument near the Los Alamos Labs and its
nuclear testing sites and waste deposits, these
charcoals reflect on landscape & geological time versus
man-made disasters, that will become part of human
and natures future.

ACOMA / PHOENIX / PARKING SPOT
NEW MEXICAN TRAVELS / WHITE SANDS IV
© KLAUS HU 2013
Driving out into the landscape, recording the south-
western landscape of New Mexico and claiming that
landscape and its history are not distinct.
The slow pace of the painting process interweaves
objective truths and subjective narratives at the same
time.
While ACOMA and its reservation in New Mexico is
one of the oldest settlements in the US still inhabited,
its nearby former uranium mines, hazardous waste
deposits, the town of Grants at route 66 with its
current high unemployment rate due to closure of the
mines, is one of the focal areas in NM, where clashes
between mining, water-resources, land-rights and
poisoned waste management become visible. Big
cities like Phoenix and Las Vegas are dependent on
water aquifers on distant land and via pipelines. The
clashes on land and its imbalances on resources are
the main underlaying subjects of these paintings.

project 2
HOW TO TRANSCEND A POOL IN SPACE
© KLAUS HU 2014
for spatial / site-specific installation
is referring to spatiotemporal/political and economic/ecological conflicts about water-rights, that will
address the future locally and globally.! “How to Transcend a Pool in Space” poses ironically the
question, if economy and science with its materialistic and capitalistic approach are still capable of
solving these conflicts.!Its reference to land-art projects of the 60´s and 70´s implies a permanent
urgency as installation.

HOW TO TRANSCEND A POOL IN SPACE
for spatial / site-specific installation
uses multiple materials for installing a pond as a pool inside factual space.
Its size is variable, but shall minimum be 6 x 6 m.
As the pond, filled with water, is constantly evaporating from liquid into fog, leaving a visible trace of
sand and stones behind, it will transcend its liquid state into a transcendental state, reminding
to earth´s constant change and transformation.
Can the vaporous water be re-collected? Will it be in a constant diffusion?
As there are now enormous droughts, due to human misuse of resources, including water,
water distribution became already an economic business, granting surplus profit for multinational
corporations.
In contrast this project requests water distribution as a transformation of local communities instead
of multinational corporations.
Installed inside space it will reflect on the poetic aspect of water as a substance for life cycles and
the basis for the constant processes on earth.
Water has been connected to the fluidity of mental processes, to libidinal energy and the sex drive
and has taken in religious mythology the symbol of purification.

UNSETTLED LANDSCAPES / oil on canvas / 200 x 140 cm © KLAUS HU 2014
This canvas juxtaposes painted archival historical photos of the American Southwest by
Timothy O´Sullivan of 1872/74 with a personal! photographic research trip to "Spiral
Jetty" by Robert Smithson at Salt Lake Utah in 2013.
It depicts the conflict between land-rights, first-nation claims, mining, especially
uranium mining till the mid 80´s,! water-rights, droughts and treatment of hazardous
waste, that still drive part of the American Southwest and its economic and cultural
decisions up to now.!

Incredible: Tents can be seen
(bottom, centre) at a point known
as Camp Beauty close to canyon
walls in Canyon de Chelly National
Monument, Arizona. Photographed
i n 1 8 7 3 a n d s i t u a t e d i n
northeastern Arizona, the area is
one of the longest continuously
inhabited landscapes in North
American and holds preserved
ruins of early indigenous people's
such as The Anasazi and Navajo. Settlement: View of the White
House, Ancestral Pueblo Native
American (Anasazi) ruins in
Canyon de Chelly, Arizona, in
1873. The cliff dwellings were built
by the Anasazi more than 500
years earlier. At the bottom, men
stand and pose on cliff dwellings
in a niche and on ruins on the
canyon floor. Climbing ropes
connect the groups of men.
Anthropologists and archeologists
place the Anasazi peoples of
Native American culture on the
continent from the 12th Century
BC. Their unique architecture
incorporated 'Great Houses' which
averaged up to 200 rooms and
could take in up to 700 people.
R o c k y : T h e s o u t h s i d e o f
Inscription Rock (now El Morro
National Monument), in New
Mexico in 1873. The prominent
feature stands near a small pool of
water, and has been a resting
place for travellers for centuries.
Since at least the 17th century,
natives, Europeans, and later
American pioneers carved names
and messages into the rock face
as they paused. In 1906, a law was
passed, prohibiting further
carving.
photos by
© Timothy O´Sullivan
1872/74

BOOK
© KLAUS HU 2013
a photographic research into the vast expansive landscape of New Mexico, USA,
made possible during residence stay at Santa Fe Art Institute in March/April 2013.
While site-specific attempts were lingering in the back of my mind, recalling Nancy Holt, Robert Smithson and Bruce Nauman, I experienced a
slow, but vast expansive landscape, full of contradictions and full of colonial and cultural clashes, that emptied my mind and my eyes from pre-
conceptions, making me drive out into the unknown, while on stay. What I experienced was a mix of reservations, clinging to casino build resorts
for income, the hispanic community living side by side of the old spanish settlers and their decedent followers, all reclaiming own territories and
land, while some towns of the 60 "s communities are driven to tourism and real estate sales. New Mexico is the state of the first atomic bomb
explosion and of dry high altitude with mountains, valleys and resorts. Being on my own, I enjoyed a photographic research, that can be called an
artists journey, discovering a vast expansive landscape.
all photos © KLAUS HU 2013
except page 57 courtesy Derrick Velasquez
and page 56 courtesy Georgia O`Keeﬀe Museum & New Mexico Museum Of Art
“The Motorbike of Georgia O´Keeﬀe

BOOK hardcover
limited edition of 25, signed
100 pages / 116 photos
some full page
size 8 1/2 " x 11" /
21,59 cm x 27,94 cm

UNSETTLED LANDSCAPES
installation views
at SomoS Berlin
May 2015

ACOMA / MADRID / BANDELIER
edition of 15 pigment print on hahnemuehlen fine art pearl each 8 1/2” x 11 “
© KLAUS HU 2013/15

WORKS http://klaushu.blogspot.com
ALUMNI AT SANTA FE ART INSTITUTE, NM, US https://sfai.org/alumni/klaus-hu/
BOOKS http://klaushu.blogspot.de/2013/07/books-editions.html
CURATORIAL http://klaushu.blogspot.com/2011/06/curatorial-research-site-specific.html
KEYNOTES http://youtube.com/klaushu
INTERVIEW about UNSETTLED LANDSCAPES with Brainard Carey at YALE UNIVERSITY
RADIO http://museumofnonvisibleart.com/interviews/klaus-hu
KLAUS HU, living and working in Berlin, born 1963 in Heidelberg / Germany.
Studio based arts in painting & photography. As extended practice he compiles curatorial and
site specific concepts with the main focus on:
1: strata / geology / genealogy
2: the digital / the sensual / appropriation
3: landscape / land-use / conflicts on resources
4: escapism / sci-fi and narrative territories
He had been invited for residencies at SANTA FE ART INSTITUTE New Mexico, USA in 2013 /
studio grant / focusing on land and land-use in the South West of the USA with the outcome as
solo exhibition at Somos Berlin in 2015. Followed by an invited Villa Medici, Rome short time
research residency in 2018, he currently continues his studio based practice on a shift of
perception in the painting process on distant landscapes and contradicting historical
perspectives in HI ALTITUDE 2019 21 for re-assessment of current ecological conflicts.
Further he prepares a transatlantic curatorial project LAYERS OF TIME including American
and European artists and historical archives, compiled in 2017 / 18 with subjects on memory,
history, perception and cultural differences.
He took part in international site-specific competitions from 2003 - today, e.g. MAXXI, Rome,
Italy, SHARJAH, UAE and GERMAN PARLIAMENT, Berlin, Germany and conference ISEA -
Singapore 2008 with the paper “On Space and Narrative Identity”.
He has selfpublished 6 books on painting / photography.
His education was in anthropology, Germanic and Romance studies / literature at University of
Heidelberg 1982 / 83 and at University of the Arts Berlin (UdK) from 1985 / 1991, and 1998 / 99
in stage design, photography and video at Achim Freyer and Katharina Sieverding. In 1992 he
received the Berlin Senate fellowship / working grant for 1 year.
STUDIO KLAUS HU
Wildenbruchstr 77
12045 Berlin / Germany
tel. +49.30.68081524
em. klaushu@yahoo.de
skype. skypeklaushu
KLAUS HU is represented by
VG BILD-KUNST, Bonn, Germany
Steuernummer 1635562802
nach § 19 Abs 1 UStG
CURRENTLY IN THE STUDIO
HI ALTITUDE 2019 / 21 painting, graphites, collages. a memory of the future and a
precognition of the prehistoric. exhibition at VILLA HEIKE BERLIN, June 2022
LAYERS OF TIME redux 2017 / 18 in progress
research for a curatorial project on the layers of history and how archives interconnect with
the studio based process. various artists from the US and Europe. in progress.
RECENTLY IN THE STUDIO
A KIND OF BLUE 2016 / 17 refines one color as the main subject for narrative and abstract
responses on daily / subjective and on geopolitical issues. studio-based.
STRIPES 2015 / 16 a series of new paintings challenges the historical and the digital archive
as source of citation as a different kind of perception and of discourse. studio-based.
UNSETTLED LANDSCAPES 2013 / 15 .
On landscape, land-use of the South West of the US - partly made possible via residency at
Santa Fe Art Institute, NM, USA, 2013 - final outcome has been presented at
SOMOS, Berlin, Germany as solo exhibition / painting / photography / with scientific talks on
uranium mining with scientist and with video / photographic presentations of the
research, while at Santa Fe Art Institute.
most recent / selection of EXHIBITIONS and PARTICIPATIONS
2022 HI ALTITUDE 2019 / 21 a memory of the future and a precognition of the prehistoric.
solo exhibition at VILLA HEIKE BERLIN, Germany.
2020 MIT EIGENEM BLICK exhibition / alumni 76 / 99 / Achim Freyer Foundation / Berlin / Germany.
2019 EARTH, FAIL BIGGER! invited for site specific competition (KUaB) in Stuttgart / Karlsruhe, Germany.
2018 / 19 ANAMORPHOSES site specific concept. participation open call for Leonardo high school. Berlin.
2018 invited for short research residency at FRENCH VILLA MEDICI / Rome, Italy.
2015 UNSETTLED LANDSCAPES, solo exhibition at SOMOS, Berlin, Germany.
2013 Residency at SANTA FE ART INSTITUTE, Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA.
2011 Exhibition at GERMAN PARLIAMENT, participation in site-specific competition. Germany.
2009 Participation in open call MAXXI, Rome, site-specific. Italy.
2009 Participation in open call, SHARJAH BIENNALE, site-specific. UAE.
2008 Invited for ISEA SINGAPORE. Singapore. on SPACE AND NARRATIVE IDENTITY. Funded by IFA, Stuttgart.
BOOKS available as print on demand. hardcover.
via epubli.de/shop/autor/KLAUS-HU/34755
1: HI ALTITUDE 2019 21 PAINTING / COLLAGES / FICTIONAL TEXT / GERMAN / ENGLISH
2: PAINTING KLAUS HU 2006 / 19 / GERMAN / ENGLISH
3: SPIRAL JETTY ACOMA BANDELIER 2013 / 14 / ENGLISH
4: NEW MEXICAN TRAVELS 2013 / ENGLISH
5: MARS_SPIRIT 2009 / 12 / ENGLISH
6: NY 92 / 12 / no text added
BIO / CV KLAUS HU

CV / KLAUS HU
1963 born in Heidelberg / Germany / runs STUDIO KLAUS HU in Berlin.
studies
2011 curatorial training at UdK, University of the Arts, Berlin
with Dr Eugen Blume (Hamburger Bahnhof Berlin), Dr Katja Blomberg (Haus am Waldsee Berlin)
and Dirk Luckow (Deichtorhallen Hamburg) among others
1998 / 99 guest study in Visual Studies at Katharina Sieverding,
UdK (University of the Arts), Berlin
1985 / 91 studies in stage design, photography, video at Achim Freyer & Marcel Odenbach
UdK, (University of the Arts) Berlin / comparable to MFA
1982 / 83 studies in Anthropology, Germanic- and Romance literature
University Heidelberg
fellowships / prizes / residencies
2020 / 21 invited residency for 18TH STREET LA, Los Angeles, USA (2 months)
(cancelled due to Covid restrictions)
2018 invited research residency Villa Medici / Rome / FRANCE / ITALY (1 month)
2013 residency SANTA FE ART INSTITUTE, NEW MEXICO, USA / studio grant
ALUMNI PAGE https://sfai.org/alumni/klaus-hu/
INTERVIEW about UNSETTLED LANDSCAPES with Brainard Carey
at YALE UNIVERSITY RADIO http://museumofnonvisibleart.com/interviews/klaus-hu
1992 Berlin Senate 1 year fellowship working grant, Berlin, GERMANY
group exhibition at Martin Gropius Bau Berlin
conferences
2008 ISEA Singapore / conference / artist/paper presentation / funded by IFA / Stuttgart
http://www.slideshare.net/klaushu/i-s-e-a-2008-k-l-a-u-s-h-u-conference-paper
2007 Mutamorphosis / Leonardo Forum Prague and Re-Place Berlin
assistances
1988 assistance for Robert Wilson, stage design and directing
exhibitions / solo and groups
2022 HI ALTITUDE 2019 / 21
painting, graphites, collages.
a memory of the future and a precognition of the prehistoric.
solo exhibition at VILLA HEIKE BERLIN, June 2022
https://klaushu.blogspot.com/2015/01/hi-altitude-2019-21.html
https://www.artrabbit.com/events/hi-altitude-2019-21
https://www.villaheike.org/aktuell
2020 / 21 MIT EIGENEM BLICK exhibition / group / alumni /
at Kunsthaus Achim Freyer / Berlin / Germany.
https://www.achimfreyer.com/project/mit-eigenem-blick/
2015 UNSETTLED LANDSCAPES, Somos Arts, Berlin, solo exhibition
http://klaushu.blogspot.com/2011/10/unsettled-landscapes-2013-15.html
https://www.somos-arts.org/unsettled-landscapes/
2013 OPEN STUDIOS at Santa Fe Art Institute, Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA,
group presentation / ALUMNI PAGE https://sfai.org/alumni/klaus-hu/
2011 KUNST_RAUM at German Parliament (Deutscher Bundestag, Berlin) presentation /
exhibition of site-specific concepts (Kunst am Bau), group exhibition
http://klaushu.blogspot.com/2011/06/curatorial-research-site-specific.html
2011 DIFFERENT WORLDS at Skalitzer140, Berlin, group exhibition
2010 END OF SUMMER SHOW at Atelierhof Berlin, group exhibition
1992 JAHRESLABOR, MARTIN GROPIUS BAU, Berlin / fellowship of Berlin Senate,
group exhibition, catalogue
1989 NEW WORKS, paintings, Gallery Deplana, Berlin, solo exhibition
participation in site-specific competitions
http://klaushu.blogspot.de/2011/06/curatorial-research-site-specific.html
2019 invited for site specific competition (KUaB), Stuttgart/Karlsruhe, Germany
2018 LEONARDO high school, Berlin, murals/anamorphosis, open call, not commissioned
2016 FAENA ART SPACE, Buenos Aires, Argentina, not commissioned
2010 MARIE ELISABETH LUEDERS HAUS, Berlin, open call, exhibition 2011
2009 SHARJAH BIENNALE, UAE, participation in open call
2009 MAXXI, Rome, participation in site-specific competition

2008 Celeste Kunstpreis Berlin, competition, participation, catalogue
2005 McCormick Freedom Museum, Chicago, competition
2005 PUBLIC ART FUND, competition, New York
2005 BUSAN BIENNAL, outdoor project, open call, Busan
2004 VENEZIA, site-specific competition
per la realizzazione di opera d ́arte nella nuova Citadella della giustizia
2003 Arriyadh housing competition, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
curatorial projects
http://klaushu.blogspot.de/2011/06/curatorial-research-site-specific.html
2017 / 18 LAYERS OF TIME in progress for 2022 / 24
2011 MAPS, research for an exhibition project for Berlin, not realized
2006 BODIES DESIRES, curatorial, for ApexArt NY
video screenings
2003 STILL RUN REMIX & NY PILOT, ART FORUM, Berlin, installation DVD
1991 / 98 video screenings at international media- and videofestivals: Sao Paulo, Brazil,
JVC Tokyo, Japan (special merit award), Cinema Arsenal, Berlin,
WRO Wroclaw, Poland, EMAF Osnabrück, Germany, AVE Arnheim, Netherlands.
most recent completed keynotes / presentations
http://youtube.com/klaushu
2019 / 22 HI ALTITUDE
painting, graphites, collages and a fictional text. German / English.
a memory of the future and a precognition of the prehistoric.
2015 UNSETTLED LANDSCAPES keynote, 35 min
keynote on land-use and resources of the North American South-West.
photos / texts / editing © Klaus Hu 2015
additional courtesy: Timothy O Sullivan
courtesy Library of Congress
High Desert Test Site © Andrea Zittel
books © the writers / authors
research photos / re. uranium tailings courtesy Center For Land Use Interpretation / CLUI
State of Mind, New California Conceptual Art ca 1970,
courtesy University of California Press, Berkeley Art Museum
Pacific Film Archive
2013 / 15 NEW MEXICAN TRAVELS 6.30 min
photos / editing © Klaus Hu 2013/15
BANDELIER 4.25 min
site-visit of archeological site in New Mexico, USA near Los Alamos Labs.
ACOMA 4.24 min site-visit of first nation reservation in New Mexico, USA
SPIRAL JETTY 5.57 min
site-visit of SPIRAL JETTY by Robert Smithson, 1969/70 at Salt Lake,
near Salt Lake City, Utah, USA , 2013
2009 / 12 MARS_SPIRIT 5.18 min
a fictional reflection about the escapist landscape of Mars.
source images courtesy NASA / JPL Caltech.
voiceover: Christopher Johnson
text excerpt: by Peter Allen "2035"
editing © Klaus Hu 2013
bibliography / books
previews : http://klaushu.blogspot.de/2013/07/books-editions.html
available as print on demand via epubli.de/shop/autor/KLAUS-HU/34755
2021/22…HI ALTITUDE 2019 21, BOOK
hardcover, 90 pages, col, 8 1/2 "x 11"
2019……PAINTING 2006 / 19, BOOK
hardcover, 100 pages, 90 photos, col, 8 1/2 "x 11"
2015……SPIRAL JETTY ACOMA MADRID BANDELIER, BOOK
hardcover, 60 pages / 33 photos
2013……NEW MEXICAN TRAVELS, BOOK
hardcover, 100 pages, 116 photos
2012……MARS_SPIRIT, BOOK
hardcover, 84 pages, 51 phot, col, 8 1/2"x 11"
2012……NY 92/12, BOOK
hardcover, 74 pages, 100 photos, b / w & col, 8 1/2 "x 11"
2010……TRILOGY MARS DESERT BEACH, 3 booklets,
2008……ISEA Singapore, conference proceeding,
http://www.slideshare.net/klaushu/documents
2008.......CELESTE KUNSTPREIS BERLIN, catalogue
1992……JAHRESLABOR BERLIN, Berlinische Galerie.Germany.groupshow.cat
1992 / 96.JVC.VIDEOFESTIVAL.TOKYO.Japan.cat
KLAUS HU IS REPRESENTED BY VG BILD-KUNST, Bonn, Germany // Steuernummer 1635562802 nach § 19 Abs 1 UStG

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