Prigov, Dmitry Aleksandrovich: God Is Dead (1993)

Dmitrij Prigov (1941–2007) was one of the founders of the Moscow conceptualist movement of the late 1960s. From the start, this kind of art was strongly opposing the dominant Soviet-speak, and was using ideologizing language – names, concepts, slogans – as raw material and stylistic means to create high art. His installation God is Dead was presented by Ludwig Museum in the summer of 1995, and included the ball-point inscription Prigov made on site, Nietzsche’s famous sentence about the death of God. The long second-storey exhibition space of the museum, then in the Buda castle, was converted into a funeral parlour by Prigov, who covered the windows, painted vast, tearful eyes and hung black draperies on the walls. Viewers had to step behind a screen at the end of the hall to find the very small inscription, and to understand whose bier it was. The central element of the scenic, spectacular installation was the unassuming, black-and-white text.