A reaction to the war?

Absolutely.

If not for this one murderous conflict in Ukraine, which is currently overshadowing everything.

Also: A Jan Kath carpet is not created in a few weeks, but in months, and if it is a new collection, it often takes years.

But it is no ordinary collection that Jan Kath presented this week on the sidelines of the Documenta in Kassel.

They are unique pieces that are also intended to provoke.

"For the first time I'm not appearing as a decorator, but as an artist," says Kath about his "Rug Bombs", which deal with violence and armed conflicts in the past decades - and with their fatal consequences such as flight and expulsion.

Peter Philipp Schmitt

Editor in the department "Germany and the World".

  • Follow I follow

Eleven carpets will be hanging in the Alte Brüderkirche in Kassel for 100 days until September 25, as long as the "documenta fifteen" lasts, which begins this Saturday.

The High Gothic monument in the middle of the city was deconsecrated 50 years ago and is part of the Renthof, which also dates from the 13th century and which, as a former Carmelite monastery and today's hotel, is flush with the church.

However, the “Bad Mouse” carpet, knotted from wool and silk, now rises five meters above the former altar.

What looks like a mouse could also be a soldier in combat gear, with slightly oversized ear defenders on the helmet, which in turn are reminiscent of mouse ears.

The figure has a machine gun in his hand.

The large-format tapestry is the only one that is not angular,

Opposite her, where the church organ once stood, hangs what is probably the most explosive work in the exhibition: "Gwen, Jep and Diana with Lilly, Pennsylvania," it says.

A family and their cat (Lilly) look down at the viewer from their living room in an almost photo-realistic way.

The scenery looks like a family idyll, if it weren't for the automatic rifle that the father proudly holds in the air, next to the smiling mother there is a revolver on the couch, against which another gun is leaning.

"The photo," says Jan Kath, "is by Kyle Cassidy and was published in his photo book 'Armed America' in 2006." Kath implemented the photo almost faithfully to the original, which technically was an immense challenge.

Four weavers spent four months in Kathmandu working on the 3.75 meter by 2.50 meter carpet.

There are 200 knots in a square inch, which is about 6.45 square centimeters - a postage stamp.

Twice each 80 colors (wool and silk) were linked.

The unique item costs 37,500 euros.

Kath asked Cassidy for permission to use the photo, and even the three people pictured gave their consent.

And with pride, because weapons are part of his culture - and also belong to the family heritage, as father Jep told the photographer.

A story he has wanted to tell for a long time

For Jan Kath, this rug marks the beginning of the story he has been trying to tell with his “Rug Bombs” since 2015 at the latest.

"The picture shows where violence comes from," says the forty-nine-year-old.

The other ten works showed the consequences: a tank going to war (“Tank”), an airplane dropping bombs (“Stealth”), a helicopter launching rockets (“Apache”), refugees in the Mediterranean ("On High Seas") and on a Greek island ("Stopover").

The "Ice People" carpet goes back the furthest in time: it also shows a famous photo from 1945, which is commonly titled "On the way across the frozen lagoon".

As a child, his aunts had told him about his great-grandmother's flight from Silesia in a horse-drawn carriage across the frozen Baltic Sea.

"I've always had a vivid imagination," says Jan Kath. "What I'm told manifests itself in visual form in my memory." The experiences of his maternal grandfather, who was a Wehrmacht soldier, have also stuck with him since childhood.

"He was deployed in Poland, France and Russia," says Kath. He took him with him into the trenches, into the fighting just before Stalingrad.

"I was there when he lost his eye and most of his comrades.

Carpets that tell of war have a long tradition.

It flourished again in Afghanistan 40 years ago when Soviet troops invaded the country.

"People started to incorporate tanks and guns into their traditional patterns," says Kath. The war had become part of their lives, and that's exactly what carpets have always been, people's everyday lives, as pictures for the wall or the living room floor shown.

With his works, Kath also refers to these “war rugs”, which inspired him as a child on their trips to the Orient together with his father Martin Kath, who, like his grandfather, dealt in carpets in Bochum.

"I see myself a bit in this continuity," says Kath. And because he has been part of this culture, which is actually alien to us, for so long, supporting and promoting it as a client in his own factories in Nepal, Thailand, India, Morocco and Turkey, nor has he appropriated it.

"There's nothing superficial about it." After the carpets have been exhibited in Kassel, Berlin and probably Paris, he definitely wants to sell them.

He has already found a gallery owner, Patrick Droste.

That, too, he says, is something completely new for him.

Because he hasn't seen himself as an artist up until now.