Five tall reinforced concrete steles stand on a meadow by the Great Segeberg Lake – an impressive monument with a total size of 528 x 950 x 600 cm. The steles are covered with an irregular pattern, with notches, surfaces, and lines stacked on top of each other at different levels. The eye seeks to follow and decipher the labyrinth, feeling as if it were immersed in a thicket. The shapes and surfaces alternate between smooth and rough, between positive and negative. Taking a few steps back and viewing the work from a greater distance, the seemingly abstract lines suddenly make sense: like a woodcut, the portrait of a Native American appears.
Photographer and sculptor Klaus Kammerichs created the multifaceted work "Five Columns for a Red Indian / Old World – New World" in 1992 as a contribution to the cultural program of the Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival. The portrait depicts He Dog, chief of the Oglala Lakota Sioux, who participated in the last great freedom struggle of the northern Plains Indians against the Americans in the 1860s and 1870s. The monument evokes diverse associations, reminiscent of the canyons and valleys of the American prairie as well as the annual Karl May Festival in Bad Segeberg. The columns are reminiscent of both Old World totem poles and New World skyscrapers. And the fractured image of the Native American provides a clear indication of his fate.
Person
Klaus Kammerichs
Klaus Kammerichs was born in Iserlohn in 1933. From 1947, he completed an apprenticeship as a photographer and worked as a press, advertising, and industrial photographer. In the 1950s, he had his first encounters with modern art. In 1953, he attended a seminar on "Subjective Photography" with Otto Steinert. In 1954, he first participated in the photokina exhibitions in Cologne. From 1956 to 1960, he studied fine art under Otto Pankok and Otoo Coester at the State Art Academy in Düsseldorf. In 1968, he began creating three- and four-dimensional (kinetic) sculptures. Since 1975, he has had various commissions for sculptures in public spaces. In 1973, he was appointed professor at the Düsseldorf University of Applied Sciences, where he served as dean from 1978 to 1984. In 1994, he received the David Octavius Hill Medal from the German Photographic Academy. He lives in Cologne and Demerath in the Eifel region.