Etwas Fehlt (Something Missing)

A blueprint for a yellow neon light to be displayed outside, Etwas Fehlt is a bold and direct statement that 'Something is missing'. Centred in the midst of a black cloud of sprayed paint, the clear Sans-serif letters express an anxiety at the beginning of a new decade - what is it that is missing at the beginning of the 1980s? Like Sol LeWitt and Bruce Nauman's drawings from the 1960s and early 1970s, Etwas Fehlt' has bold aesthetic appeal but is principally about the underlying concept. Asked for whom Schütte makes works of art for, the artist replied: 'That's an interesting question, for what or for whom you're actually working. Is it doing the work, is it the family, is it fame, is it money? At the moment it's a very open question. I still think that the arts should somehow be religious'.

(T. Schütte, quoted in Thomas Schütte, exh. cat., Sammlung Goetz, Munich 2001, p. 88).