If the students of the Gauß-Gymnasium in Gelsenkirchen found this year’s return after the summer holidays less monotonous and gray than ever, then it could have something to do with Beni Veltum. The graffiti artist, considered the best known in the city, struck during the holidays. Quite legally and at the request of the headmaster.
Together with the painter Heinrich Schmid and the artists Levin Tomala and Mesky, Veltum took on the corridor walls to the auditorium and provided them with a giant painting, from floor to ceiling, meter high, meter long. Certainly the craziest school hallway far and wide. The extremely colorful work of art shows all kinds of poets and thinkers, buildings and myths from European history. A Europe exhibition, they say, and that can never hurt, after all, Europe has always been in search of itself. Fresh material can’t hurt.
Beethoven is now emblazoned on the wall, Martin Luther, Albert Einstein, Immanuel Kant and of course Carl-Friedrich Gauss, the famous mathematician. That the selection of the European motifs is a bit male and Germany-heavy – so be it. Beni Veltum is certain: “It’s the most blatant thing I’ve ever done.” Want to say: Even blatant than, for example, the giant picture of ex-Chancellor Angela Merkel, which he made in 2020 when she visited Essen’s Zollverein colliery. The Merkel portrait read in bold: “Hömma, so nice, you’re here!!!” A wonderful compliment that the Gelsenkirchen pupils – oh what, all eleven in the republic – deserved as soon as they entered their school. But maybe Veltum will add that at a later date. A few corridor walls should still be free.
