one way communication is a dictate (Nam June Paik, 1974)

isn’t art a remarkable thing? (Robert Filliou, Ample Food for Stupid Thought, 1965)

Susanne Rennert, PhD, is an independent art historian, curator, and writer based in Düsseldorf. Her research focus includes Fluxus and intermedia, art of the 1950s–1970s and its interdisciplinary aspects, the Rhineland art scene after 1945 within an international framework, and contemporary art in relation to socio-political contexts.

Susanne Rennert has published extensively on postwar and contemporary art and was an early contributor to the scholarship on significant but then-overlooked figures in international art history, including Arthur (Addi) Køpcke, Chris Reinecke, Gerhard Hoehme, Dorothy Iannnone, and Jean-Pierre Wilhelm. (1990 Master Thesis at Ludwig Maximilians-Universität München: Jörg Immendorff and Chris Reinecke: LIDL, Konzepte und Aktionen, 1968–1970; 1995 Dissertation at the University of Cologne: Arthur Køpcke, Bilder, Objekte, Fluxus-Stücke.)

She has collaboratively organized exhibitions for major institutions in Germany and abroad, including Kunsthalle Düsseldorf, Kunstverein für die Rheinlande und Westfalen, Museum Kunstpalast, Museum Fridericianum, and Artists Space, New York.

With a particular commitment to archival and discovery-based research, Susanne Rennert worked as an external art historian for Museum Abteiberg Mönchengladbach from 2016 to 2024. She is the author of the digital archive project www.museum-moenchengladbach-1967-1978.de (realized together with Susanne Titz). She also facilitated the acquisition of the Andersch Collection/Archive – one of the largest Fluxus-collections worldwide – at Museum Abteiberg (2018).

Most recently, she curated the exhibition “It’s really all very fluent.” Joseph Beuys & Fluxus at Museum Schloss Moyland (2025/26), showing how the works and actions of George Maciunas, Nam June Paik, Henning Christiansen, and Robert Filliou inspired Beuys.

Susanne Rennert is currently continuing work on the publication project about the life and work of René Block („Exercises In Respect“). Furthermore she is writing about the famous stage designer Teo Otto.