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Lord Jim Lodge

From EverybodyWiki Bios & Wiki


Lord Jim Loge
Lord Jim Loge powered by monochrom, Coca-Cola Light Art Edition, 2006
Formation1985
FounderJörg Schlick, Martin Kippenberger, Albert Oehlen, Wolfgang Bauer
Founded atGraz, Austria
TypeArtists' association; conceptual art project
PurposeContemporary art, conceptual branding, artists' network

Lord Jim Loge is an Austrian-German artists' association and conceptual art project originally founded in Graz in 1985 by figures including Jörg Schlick, Martin Kippenberger, Albert Oehlen and writer Wolfgang Bauer.[1][2] The Städel Museum records the original group as having been founded in 1985 and dissolved in 1997.[3]

The Loge became known through its motto, Keiner hilft keinem ("Nobody Helps Nobody"), and through the signet Sonne Busen Hammer ("Sun Breasts Hammer"), a motif incorporating a sun, a pair of breasts and a hammer.[4][5] The signet appeared in works by artists associated with the group, in Schlick's magazine Sonne Busen Hammer, and in Kippenberger's later METRO-Net project.[4][6][7][8]

After Schlick's death in 2005, the Vienna-based art group monochrom continued the Loge as Lord Jim Loge powered by monochrom.[9] monochrom used the continuation for projects dealing with intellectual property, branding, franchising, the creative industries and the art market.[10]

History

Founding and members

The Lord Jim Loge emerged in Graz in the mid-1980s. Radio Prague International described it as a group founded in 1985 by Schlick together with Kippenberger, Oehlen and Bauer.[1] Gagosian similarly describes the Loge as a secret society co-founded in the mid-1980s by Kippenberger with Bauer, Oehlen and Schlick.[2] The Städel Museum classifies the Lord Jim Loge as a Künstlervereinigung ("artists' association") and lists Kippenberger and Oehlen as founding members.[3]

The name refers to Joseph Conrad's 1900 novel Lord Jim.[11] The group operated less as a conventional art movement with a unified style than as a network, in-joke, sign system and recurring conceptual brand within the work of its members and their circle.[4]

The Loge also appeared as a publishing and edition context: the Museum of Modern Art lists Kippenberger and Oehlen's 1985 artist's book The Cologne Manifesto as published by Edition Lord Jim Loge in Graz, Cologne and Hamburg.[12]

The Städel Museum lists Arnulf Rainer as a member of the Loge.[3] The Universalmuseum Joanneum describes the Loge as a "secret society" which also included Rainer and Niki Lauda, and notes that its reputation contributed to Schlick's public image as an artistic agitator.[13]

Sonne Busen Hammer and Keiner hilft keinem

The motto of the Loge was Keiner hilft keinem, usually translated as "Nobody Helps Nobody" or "No one helps nobody".[2][4][5] Its signet, Sonne Busen Hammer ("Sun Breasts Hammer"), combined a sun, a pair of breasts and a hammer.[2][4][5] The motto and emblem functioned as portable signs that could be inserted into paintings, publications and other artistic contexts.

According to Christie's, the Lodge's "quixotic, media-savvy yet knowingly impossible quest" was to make the Sonne Busen Hammer logo more famous than the Coca-Cola logo.[4] The motif appeared in works by several artists associated with the group and recurred in Kippenberger's paintings and sculptural works.[4][5] The Universalmuseum Joanneum describes Schlick's works as having been "branded" by the Loge's distinctive and ambiguous logo.[13]

Logo and "better known than Coca-Cola"

The ambition to make the Loge's signet better known than the Coca-Cola logo became one of the recurring myths and conceptual motors of the project.[4][5] In auction and art-historical commentary, the logo is often discussed as part of Kippenberger's broader use of self-mythologizing, absurd collective identities and deliberately unstable branding.[4][5]

Kippenberger's 1985 painting Falsches Zeichen der Lord Jim Loge ("Wrong Sign of the Lord Jim Loge") directly invokes the Loge and its signet.[4] The signet also appears in relation to his self-portraits and his later METRO-Net project.[4][5]

Relationship to Schlick, Kippenberger, Oehlen and Bauer

Jörg Schlick was one of the central figures of the Loge. Halle für Kunst Steiermark describes him as a member of the Lord Jim Loge and editor of Sonne Busen Hammer, the central organ of the Loge.[14] Schlick's practice has often been discussed in relation to networks, self-branding, appropriation and the blurring of individual and collective authorship.

Kippenberger incorporated the Loge's signet and motto into several works. In the 1990s, he developed METRO-Net, a series of simulated subway entrances and ventilation shafts installed in locations without functioning underground railways.[2] Gagosian describes the first METRO-Net entrance, opened on the Greek island of Syros in 1993, as leading to a cast-iron gate marked with the Lord Jim Loge emblem.[2] A later entrance in Dawson City, Canada, included both the Loge motif and the letters "NHN", shorthand for "Nobody Helps Nobody".[2]

Kunstforum International likewise noted that Kippenberger's apparent subway shafts ended after a few metres at locked gates bearing the emblem of the Lord Jim Loge, which the article characterized as Kippenberger's men's club.[6] The literary scholar Kai Hammermeister has discussed METRO-Net as an example of Kippenberger's "romantic globalization", noting that the Dawson City, Leipzig and Kassel entrances were decorated with the emblem of the fictional Lord Jim Lodge.[8]

Albert Oehlen and Wolfgang Bauer are repeatedly named in sources as founding figures of the Loge.[1][2] The Loge was thus linked to a Graz and German-language art-literary milieu that included painting, literature, performance, publishing and artist-run myth-making.

Sonne Busen Hammer

Magazine and central organ

Sonne Busen Hammer was the title of a publication associated with the Loge. Artforum described the 1991 book Sonne Busen Hammer as being advertised by its subtitle as the "Central Organ of the Lord Jim Lodge", which it called "a mysterious arts society in Graz, Austria".[7] Halle für Kunst Steiermark also identifies Schlick as editor of the magazine Sonne, Busen, Hammer, the central organ of the Lord Jim Loge.[15]

The publication functioned as a vehicle for the Loge's emblematic language and as a print-based extension of the group's network. It connected Schlick, Kippenberger, Oehlen, Bauer and other artists, writers and gallerists associated with the Loge and its surrounding milieu.

Publication history

The original issues of Sonne Busen Hammer appeared in the 1990s. Artforum refers to the 1991 book as the Loge's "Central Organ".[7] Antiquarian and library records identify individual issues from the 1990s with subtitles such as Die Bleich-Rossi-Nummer, Die Graznummer and Die Exjunggesellennummer.[16][17]

After the takeover by monochrom, further issues were published through edition mono. Halle für Kunst & Medien Graz listed Sonne Busen Hammer Heft 19 – monochrom #36: Die Laufhausnummer – Creative Class Escorts, published by edition mono / monochrom in 2015, in connection with an event on the Lord Jim Loge and Schlick's artist network.[18]

Selected issues include:

  • Sonne Busen Hammer: Das Zentralorgan der Lord Jim Loge, early 1990s issues edited by or associated with Jörg Schlick.[16]
  • Die Aufbruchsnummer, Sonne Busen Hammer 16 / monochrom 24, edition mono, 2006.
  • Die Ölzweignummer, Sonne Busen Hammer 17 / monochrom 25, edition mono, 2007.
  • Sehr unangenehme Gesellschaft. Die Gesundschlachtungsnummer, Sonne Busen Hammer 18 / monochrom 35, edition mono, 2014.[19]
  • Die Laufhausnummer – Creative Class Escorts, Sonne Busen Hammer 19 / monochrom 36, edition mono, 2015.[18]

Takeover by monochrom

Rights acquisition

In 2005, shortly before Schlick's death, monochrom announced that it had taken over the Lord Jim Loge's trademark and usage rights and continued the project as Lord Jim Loge powered by monochrom.[9][10][20] A University of Salzburg text on context hacking describes the takeover as a narrative and artistic operation in which Schlick handed the Loge over to monochrom in the form of a hostile takeover by an "up-and-coming young neoliberal artists' group".[10]

The takeover was framed as a parody of intellectual-property enforcement, mergers and acquisitions, franchising and neoliberal restructuring in the art field.[10] monochrom presented the Loge as a brand whose signs, motto and symbolic capital could be owned, relaunched and exploited.[11]

Lord Jim Loge powered by monochrom

Under the name Lord Jim Loge powered by monochrom, the group staged projects that treated the Loge as a corporate-artistic franchise. The Gap described monochrom's later use of the Loge as part of its broader practice of mixing art, media intervention and institutional parody.[9]

The continuation also reinterpreted the historical Loge's male-bond and secret-society connotations. steirischer herbst described the Lord Jim Loge as a "legendary male society" deeply entwined with Graz and the festival, and noted that it had been "ironically taken over by monochrom" in 2005.[21]

Intellectual property and art-market parody

The takeover was accompanied by a rhetoric of trademark ownership, legal threats, brand management and the exploitation of artistic value. The project has been discussed in relation to "context hacking", a practice associated with monochrom in which cultural signs and institutional frameworks are appropriated, reframed and redirected.[10]

In the 2011 volume Geistiges Eigentum und Originalität: Zur Politik der Wissens- und Kulturproduktion, a chapter titled "We're only in it for the Markenwert. Die Übernahme der Lord Jim Loge durch monochrom" dealt with the takeover of the Loge by monochrom.[22] The title itself framed the project through a mixture of pop-cultural irony, brand value and intellectual-property critique.

Coca-Cola Light Art Edition

In 2006, monochrom entered the Coca-Cola Light Art Edition / Coca-Cola Light Art Award with the Lord Jim Loge project.[23][11] The project explicitly referred back to the historical ambition of making the Sonne Busen Hammer signet better known than the Coca-Cola logo.[11][4][5]

The Loge won the award, and the Lord Jim Loge design appeared on 50,000 Coca-Cola Light Art Edition bottles.[23][9] monochrom interpreted the intervention as a symbolic realization of the Loge's Coca-Cola ambition: the Loge's signet temporarily appeared on Coca-Cola bottles themselves.[11]

The project also generated a twelve-part oil-painting cycle narrating the history of the Lord Jim Loge and its takeover by monochrom.[9]

Later projects

steirischer herbst 2013 and One Night Stands

In 2013, Lord Jim Loge powered by monochrom appeared in the One Night Stands series at steirischer herbst. The festival described the format as a series of unpredictable meetings between artists or artist groups who had not previously crossed paths, with the first encounter involving monochrom and the Lord Jim Loge.[21] The same description characterized the Loge as a legendary male society deeply connected to Graz and steirischer herbst, and noted its ironic takeover by monochrom in 2005.[21]

Sonne Busen Hammer 18 and the Singapore mission

The 2014 issue Sonne Busen Hammer 18, also published as monochrom 35, was connected to a competition and mission involving the artist Roswitha Weingrill. According to the steirischer herbst archive, Weingrill won the contest and undertook a mission for the Lord Jim Loge, a trip to Singapore that was documented in the issue of the Loge's official organ.[19]

The project continued the Loge's practice of combining publication, fictionalized institutional ritual and art-world parody. The subtitle of the issue, Sehr unangenehme Gesellschaft. Die Gesundschlachtungsnummer, referred to the language of restructuring and liquidation in a way consistent with monochrom's treatment of the Loge as an art-market and corporate parody.[19]

Creative Class Escorts

In 2015, Lord Jim Loge powered by monochrom initiated Creative Class Escorts – Das erste Laufhaus für Kreative ("the first brothel for creatives") in Lindabrunn, Lower Austria.[24][25] Deutschlandfunk reported on the project as an intervention into modern art marketing and the service economy of creative labour.[24]

The accompanying publication, Sonne Busen Hammer 19 – Die Laufhausnummer – Creative Class Escorts, appeared in 2015 as monochrom 36.[18] The project presented artists as bookable "creative escorts" and examined flexibility, mobility and exploitation in contemporary creative work.[25]

Graz 2038 – Olympic Winter Games

Poster for the “Graz 2038” campaign, 2026

In June 2026, Lord Jim Lodge launched “Graz 2038 – Olympic Winter Games”, a fictional campaign presenting Graz as a host city for the 2038 Winter Olympics. The project used the expanded slogan “Sun. Breasts. Hammer. Snow.” and included posters, manifesto texts and a website.[26][27]

Reception and interpretation

Art branding

The Lord Jim Loge has been interpreted as an example of art branding before and against the ordinary logic of corporate branding. Its motto, emblem and demand for circulation turned artistic authorship into a distributed system of signs. Christie's describes the Loge's effort to circulate its signet as a media-savvy but knowingly impossible project to outdo Coca-Cola's recognizability.[4] Sotheby's likewise discusses the Sonne Busen Hammer symbol in relation to the Loge's ambition to rival the visibility of Coca-Cola.[5] The later monochrom takeover radicalized this aspect by explicitly staging the Loge as an intellectual-property asset and art-market franchise.[10]

Secret society and male-bond parody

Several sources describe the Loge through the language of secrecy, lodge structures and male bonding. Artforum called it a "mysterious arts society" in Graz.[7] steirischer herbst described it as a "legendary male society" associated with Graz and the festival.[21] Kunstforum International characterized it as Kippenberger's men's club in the context of METRO-Net.[6]

This language has also been central to the Loge's later reception. monochrom's continuation of the project reworked the masculine and secret-society elements into a parody of inclusion, branding and neoliberal institutional language.[10]

Schlick reception and Kippenberger/Oehlen art-market context

In reception, the Loge is frequently discussed through the careers of Schlick, Kippenberger and Oehlen. Halle für Kunst Steiermark places Schlick's role in the Loge alongside his editorship of Sonne Busen Hammer and his collaborations with Bauer and Kippenberger.[14] The Universalmuseum Joanneum describes the Loge's logo as part of the branding of Schlick's work and reputation.[13]

In the Kippenberger context, the Loge is usually treated as part of a larger practice of fictional institutions, absurd slogans, self-mythology and unstable art-world authorship. The METRO-Net works in particular gave the Loge's signet an international afterlife by placing it on fictive subway entrances and gates.[2][6][8]

Publications

  • Friesinger, Günther; Grenzfurthner, Johannes; Ballhausen, Thomas (2013). Context Hacking: How to Mess with Art, Media, Law and the Market. edition mono / monochrom. ISBN 978-3-902796-13-4. Search this book on
  • "We're only in it for the Markenwert. Die Übernahme der Lord Jim Loge durch monochrom", in Kroeger, Odin; Friesinger, Günther; Lohberger, Paul; Ortland, Eberhard, eds. (2011). Geistiges Eigentum und Originalität: Zur Politik der Wissens- und Kulturproduktion. Vienna: Turia + Kant. ISBN 978-3-85132-613-0. Search this book on

See also

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 "Österreichische zeitgenössische Kunst in tschechischen Sammlungen". Radio Prague International (in Deutsch). 25 June 2010. Retrieved 6 May 2026.
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 2.5 2.6 2.7 2.8 "Art Basel Unlimited 2025: Martin Kippenberger". Gagosian. 16 June 2025. Retrieved 6 May 2026.
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 "Lord Jim Loge". Digitale Sammlung (in Deutsch). Städel Museum. Retrieved 6 May 2026.
  4. ↑ 4.00 4.01 4.02 4.03 4.04 4.05 4.06 4.07 4.08 4.09 4.10 4.11 4.12 "Martin Kippenberger (1953–1997), Falsches Zeichen der Lord Jim Loge". Christie's. Retrieved 6 May 2026.
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 5.3 5.4 5.5 5.6 5.7 5.8 "Martin Kippenberger: Ohne Titel / Keiner hilft Keinem". Sotheby's. 2016. Retrieved 6 May 2026.
  6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 6.2 6.3 "Metro to Nowhere". Kunstforum International (in Deutsch). Retrieved 6 May 2026.
  7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 7.2 7.3 Birnbaum, Daniel (September 2005). "Man Without Qualities". Artforum. Retrieved 6 May 2026.
  8. ↑ 8.0 8.1 8.2 Hammermeister, Kai (2007). "Romantic Globalization: Martin Kippenberger's 'Metro-Net'". Monatshefte. 99 (1): 22–30. JSTOR 30154322.
  9. ↑ 9.0 9.1 9.2 9.3 9.4 Gotthardt, Yannick (28 January 2013). "MUSA: Monochrom wird 20". The Gap (in Deutsch). Retrieved 6 May 2026.
  10. ↑ 10.0 10.1 10.2 10.3 10.4 10.5 10.6 "Context Hacking: Storytelling und Narration in der Kunst" (PDF). w-k.sbg.ac.at (in Deutsch). University of Salzburg. Retrieved 6 May 2026.
  11. ↑ 11.0 11.1 11.2 11.3 11.4 "Lord Jim Loge / Coke Light Art". monochrom. Retrieved 6 May 2026.
  12. ↑ "Martin Kippenberger with Albert Oehlen: The Cologne Manifesto". The Museum of Modern Art. Retrieved 6 May 2026.
  13. ↑ 13.0 13.1 13.2 "Schlick, Jörg: 20 museums and 1 zoo in Graz and Styria". Universalmuseum Joanneum. Retrieved 6 May 2026.
  14. ↑ 14.0 14.1 "Jörg Schlick: Monograph and Catalogue Raisonné". Halle für Kunst Steiermark. Retrieved 6 May 2026.
  15. ↑ "Albert Oehlen / Luke Calzonetti: JB Slik in the mix". Halle für Kunst Steiermark. Retrieved 6 May 2026.
  16. ↑ 16.0 16.1 "SONNE BUSEN HAMMER Das Zentralorgan der Lord Jim Loge". Booklooker (in Deutsch). Retrieved 6 May 2026.
  17. ↑ "Sonne, Busen, Hammer: das Zentralorgan der Lord-Jim-Loge". Belvedere Library catalogue (in Deutsch). Retrieved 6 May 2026.
  18. ↑ 18.0 18.1 18.2 "Jörg Schlick. Lord Jim Lodge and Artist Network". Künstlerhaus, Halle für Kunst & Medien Graz. 22 October 2015. Retrieved 6 May 2026.
  19. ↑ 19.0 19.1 19.2 "monochrom #35 – Sonne Busen Hammer 18". steirischer herbst archive. Retrieved 6 May 2026.
  20. ↑ "monochrom übernimmt die Lord Jim Loge". APA-OTS (in Deutsch). 29 March 2006. Retrieved 6 May 2026.
  21. ↑ 21.0 21.1 21.2 21.3 "monochrom / Lord Jim Loge: One Night Stands 1". steirischer herbst archive. Retrieved 6 May 2026.
  22. ↑ "Geistiges Eigentum und Originalität: Inhalt" (PDF). Turia + Kant (in Deutsch). Retrieved 6 May 2026.
  23. ↑ 23.0 23.1 "Flaschenkunst". Der Standard (in Deutsch). 20 September 2006. Retrieved 6 May 2026.
  24. ↑ 24.0 24.1 "Moderne Kunstvermarktung: Laufhaus der Kreativen". Deutschlandfunk (in Deutsch). 20 July 2015. Retrieved 6 May 2026.
  25. ↑ 25.0 25.1 "Creative Class Escorts: Das erste Laufhaus fuer Kreative". monochrom (in Deutsch). 5 July 2015. Retrieved 6 May 2026.
  26. ↑ "Lord Jim Loge mischt den Grazer Wahlkampf auf". MeinBezirk.at (in Deutsch). 1 June 2026. Retrieved 2 June 2026.
  27. ↑ "Lord Jim Lodge – Graz Olympia 2038" (in Deutsch). Retrieved 2 June 2026.

Further reading

  • Schilcher, Petra; Schilcher, Ralph, eds. (2011). Memory: Remembering Jörg Schlick (1951–2005). Graz: Joseph Windisch art productions. Search this book on
  • Krystof, Doris; Morgan, Jessica (2006). Martin Kippenberger. London: Tate Publishing. ISBN 9781854376343. Search this book on
  • Hammermeister, Kai (2007). "Romantic Globalization: Martin Kippenberger's 'Metro-Net'". Monatshefte. 99 (1): 22–30. JSTOR 30154322.
  • Kroeger, Odin; Friesinger, Günther; Lohberger, Paul; Ortland, Eberhard, eds. (2011). Geistiges Eigentum und Originalität: Zur Politik der Wissens- und Kulturproduktion. Vienna: Turia + Kant. ISBN 978-3-85132-613-0. Search this book on

External links



This article "Lord Jim Lodge" is from Wikipedia. The list of its authors can be seen in its historical and/or the page Edithistory:Lord Jim Lodge. Articles copied from Draft Namespace on Wikipedia could be seen on the Draft Namespace of Wikipedia and not main one.


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