Asger Jorn

Asger Oluf Jorn (born Asger Oluf Jørgensen, 3 March 1914, Vejrum, Jutland, Denmark – 1 May 1973, Århus, Denmark) was a Danish painter, sculptor, ceramic artist, and author. He was a founding member of the avant-garde movement COBRA and the Situationist International.

The largest collection of Asger Jorn's works—including his major work Stalingrad—can be seen in the Museum Jorn, Silkeborg, Denmark. Jorn willed his property and the works of art located inside to the Municipality of Albissola Marina (Savona), so that the italian museum called Casa Museo Jorn was created for displaying his works.

Pour la forme, 1957, Log.

Publications

• co-editor, Helhesten, 12 numbers (9 issues), Apr 1941-Nov 1944. Journal. (Danish)
• "Hvad er et ornament?", Dansk Kunsthaandvterk 21:8, Copenhagen, 1948. (Danish)
  • "What Is an Ornament?", in Jorn, Fraternité Avant Tout, 2011, pp 196-212. (English)
• Pour la forme: ébauche d’une méthodologie des arts, Paris: Internationale situationniste, 1957; repr. as Pour la forme: ébauche d’une méthodologie des arts précédé de Dix années d’art expérimental: Jorn et son rôle dans l’invention théorique par G.-E. Debord, pref. Guy Debord, Paris: Allia, 2001, 157 pp. (French)
• with Guy Debord, Fin de Copenhague, Bauhaus Imaginiste, May 1957, 40 pp; repr., Paris: Allia, 2001. (French)
• with Guy Debord, Mémoires, Paris: Internationale Situationniste, Dec 1958, [64] pp; 2nd ed., Copenhagen, 1959; repr., Jean-Jacques Pauvert aux Belles Lettres, 1993. (French)
  • Mémoires, trans. Ian Thompson, 2015. Facsimile trans. (English)
• Modifications: R.A. Augustinci présente vingt peintures modifiées par Asger Jorn, Paris: Galerie Rive Gauche, [May 1959], [16+4] pp. Catalogue. [1] (French)
• with Guy Debord and Jacqueline de Jong, Hands off Alexander Trocchi!, Paris: Internationale Situationniste, 7 Oct 1960, [1] p, HTML, HTML. [2] [3] (English)
• Critique de la politique économique suivie de La Lutte Finale, Paris: Internationale Situationniste, [1960], 38 pp; repr., Paris: Sens & Tonka, 2001. (French)
  • Value and Economy: Critique of Political Economy and the Exploitation of the Unique, Scandinavian Institute of Comparative Vandalism, 1962, 99 pp, PDF. (English)
• with Jacqueline de Jong, You or Not You Who Else?, 1964. Artists' book of pencil drawings. [4]
• with Noël Arnaud, La langue verte et la cuite, Pauvert, 1968, 327 pp. Written in reaction to the 1964 book Le cru et le cuit [The Raw and the Cooked] by Claude Lévi-Strauss, which was an examination of structuralist theory. [5] (French)

• Open Creation and Its Enemies, with Originality and Magnitude (on the System of Isou), trans. Fabian Tompsett, London: Unpopular Books, 1994, 47 pp. Trans. from Internationale Situationniste 4 & 5. (English)
• Discours aux pingouins et autres écrits, Paris: Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts, 2001. (French)
• La Genèse naturelle: sur la situation singulière qu’occupent dans l’humanité les mâles, Paris: Allia, 2001. (French)
  • A Génese Natural: Sobre a Situação Singular dos Machos na Humanidade, trans. Marta Lança, Lisbon: Antígona, 2014, 122 pp. [6] (Portuguese)
  • Estestvennaya istoriya raya [Естественная история Рая], trans. V.Lapitskiy (Виктор Лапицкий), St. Petersburg: Jaromir Hladik press, 2019, 96 pp. [7] (Russian)
• Asger Jorn: la planète, Paris: Adam Biro, and Strasbourg: Musée d’art moderne et contemporain, 2001. Catalogue. (French)
• Fraternité Avant Tout: Asger Jorn's Writings on Art and Architecture, 1938-1958, ed. Ruth Baumeister, Rotterdam: 010 Publishers, 2011. (English)
• Jorn International, ed. Jørgen Sørensen, Aarhus: ARoS Kunstmuseum, 2011. Catalogue. (Danish)/(English)
• with Jacqueline de Jong, The Case of the Ascetic Satyr: Snapshots from Eternity, New York: JdJ/D.A.P., 2015, [48]+56 pp. Artists' book. A companion volume includes essays on the piece by Kevin Repp, Marc Lenot, Roberto Ohrt, Karen Kurszinsky and Axel Heil. Review: Marcus (Artforum). [8] [9] (English)

• more, [10]

Documentary films

• Asger Jorn, dir. Ejner Johansson, 1983.

Literature

• Laurent Gervereau, Critique de l’image quotidienne: Asger Jorn, Paris: Cercle d'art, 2001. (French)

• Karen Kurczynski, "Expression as Vandalism: Asger Jorn's 'Modifications'", RES: Anthropology and Aesthetics 53-54, Spring-Autumn 2008, pp 293-313.

• Karen Kurczynski, The Art and Politics of Asger Jorn: The Avant-Garde Won't Give Up, Ashgate, 2014, 261 pp. Introduction.

• Knut Stene-Johansen, Nødinnganger: studier i Asger Jorn: essay, Oslo: Scandinavian Academic Press, 2014, 263 pp. [11]. Review: Flor. (Norwegian)

• Ruth Baumeister, Asger Jorn in Images, Words, and Forms, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2015.

• Ellef Prestsæter (ed.), Open Creation and Its Enemies: Asger Jorn in Situation, Valencia: Institut Valencià d’Art Modern (IVAM), 2023, 284 pp. Exhibition. (English)/(Catalan)/(Spanish)

See also

• Imaginist Bauhaus
• Situationist International

Links

• http://sicv.activearchives.org/w
• https://salvaged.work/
• Jorn in Weilbachs Kunstnerleksikon (Danish)