2 Benches

Jenny Holzer installed five stone benches from her Under a Rock series in the Schlossgarten for the 1987 Skulptur Projekte. Two of those benches remain on a tree-lined path in the park today. They are positioned in such a way that they incorporate a nearby monument made by sculptor Alexander Frerichmann in 1923. The inscription on the war memorial states: “Even if everything around us has sunk, let us not ourselves degenerate! Maintain both sword and honour undefiled! Our dead ones – await!”
The text inscribed on the benches gives an anonymous account of the most brutal acts of war, which are all the more disturbing because of the succinct language they use. There are phrases like: “People go to the river where it is lush and muddy to shoot captives, to float or sink them.” Or “The soldiers shoot at running women and children who want to sneak away.” They contain no indication of what war is being described and the authors are not mentioned.
The font is the same as that of gravestones in American cemeteries. As such, the benches are perceived less as seating than as grave slabs or epitaphs. These aggressive, but sometimes abstract poetic inscriptions visually complement the war memorial, while also opposing it in terms of content.

Additional Information: www.skulptur-projekte.de

Further Reading:
Skulptur-Projekte 1987 in Münster, eds. Klaus Bußmann and Kasper König, Cologne 1987, pp. 125–132.