Anette Lenz sets standards. The reason she has only recently been on the radar in Germany is that she has lived and worked in Paris since the nineties. Initially as part of the famous Grapus collective, later with Beuys' master student Alex Jordan and finally on her own, she successfully designed countless campaigns – even though she works almost exclusively for the cultural sector. The Museum Angewandte Kunst in Frankfurt am Main is currently dedicated to the life's work of the grande dame of French graphic design. The exhibition "Anette Lenz. à propos" is open until January 3, 2021. During the press tour, form asked Anette Lenz a few questions. Three of them can be found in the current form 289, the rest here:

Ms. Lenz, at Grapus, working with commercial clients was categorically excluded. Would you say you have maintained that?

ANETTE LENZ I am not against commerce. Commerce keeps our society running. However, I am against using my creativity to create a desire they don't really need – just to keep a system going that I don't believe in. But that doesn't mean I wouldn't like to work for a well-made product that is ethically produced, for example.

After studying in Munich in 1989, you went straight to France and stayed there. Why?

AL Wanderlust. I just wanted to explore the world. I didn't initially think I'd stay in France for long. I actually wanted to go to New York afterwards. But then I got stuck because I had the opportunity to work with Grapus. It was already the final phase of Grapus. Afterwards, one of the members, Alex Jordan, who also taught in Berlin Weissensee and was a Beuys student himself, offered me to become a new founding member of Nous travaillons ensemble (NTE). That was a group of graphic designers I worked with for three years. I simply had to seize that opportunity. I was just 25 at the time and came from the Munich University of Applied Sciences, where I had learned formal language and typographic work. The years with Grapus and Alex were like a second education for me: We discussed a lot about concepts, about content, about the place of our work in society. That was very intense and formative. In the end, we no longer agreed formally because I was looking for other forms.

Other forms?

AL Every form is also content. At Grapus, the aim was to counter commercial formal language with a different, socio-cultural one. Graphic design in France had developed primarily from painting. Swiss, Dutch, and German graphic designers who came to France brought their respective formal languages with them. I tried to develop my own language from both influences.

To what extent does Paris influence you creatively?

AL All of life influences me, everything influences me. We are visually perceiving beings. What I see in the street, the people, the shapes, the cinema, the exhibitions I see: everything has an influence on creation. Not directly, sometimes indirectly, sometimes years later through associations.

That means you wouldn't make a distinction between what you perceive in general and a specific place where you are?

AL I do think that my perception goes beyond Paris. I also like being in nature. That's a cliché, but it's really true: nature inspires me. Just as the city inspires me. I went to Paris in 1989. That was at the same time as the fall of the Berlin Wall, I could have gone to Berlin then. But I went to Paris because the international aspect attracted me. It was simply this multicultural melting pot, which didn't exist in Germany in that way at the time. I dreamed of learning more about the world – and that also happens in confrontation with different cultures and ways of thinking. Paris definitely gave me that.

Some of your works are very contemplative. To what extent do you connect spirituality or religion with design?

AL I believe that everything is connected and all energy, all intentions that we send out and, for example, put into a work, also arrive. Often unconsciously. I have spiritual affinities – in the sense that I am convinced that there is this connection between all of us. Just through our existence. But that would be a longer story…

© Museum Angewandte Kunst, Frankfurt am Main
Anette Lenz: à propos
Museum für Angewandte Kunst
Frankfurt am Main
until January 3, 2021

Further information about the exhibition can be found HERE.