Friday 22 May 2009, 19.00–20.00
Saturday 23 May 2009, 17.00–18.00
Saturday 23 May 2009, 19.00–20.00
Sunday 24 May 2009, 16.00–17.00
Monday 25 May 2009, 16.00–17.00

'Something we need to reach today is unity between life and our art practice', Jannis Kounellis (b. 1936, Piraeus), 1968.

In the poetic work Untitled (1971), Kounellis painted an extract from the score of Bach's St John Passion on a dark green canvas and had a cellist playing music from the oratorio in front of it on the occasion of its first exhibition. This work will be on view in the Energy and Process collection rooms and cellist Neil Heyde will re-create the original performance.

Jannis Kounellis (born in Piraeus in Greece, lives and works in Rome since 1956) was a seminal contributor to the radically and internationally influential Arte Povera group and he continues to inspire young artists today. Often epic in scale, Kounellis's work possesses a grandeur that reflects his frequent choice of themes and ideas from the past and emphasises the fragmentary relationship the past has with the present.

His early works were 'sign' and 'alphabet' paintings, incorporating large black letters, arrows or mathematical symbols that were often stencilled to diminish evidence of the artist's touch. In 1966-7, Kounellis began to incorporate three-dimensional materials into his paintings. By the following year, they had become installations resembling stage sets, in which the viewers were the actors.

Tate Modern  Level 5
Free