Mike Steiner and Contemporary Art: Pioneer of Video Art and Experimental Expression

Discover how contemporary art innovator Mike Steiner reshaped media boundaries, from abstract paintings to groundbreaking video art. His legacy remains central to the narrative of Contemporary Arts Berlin.

Mike Steiner’s work is a vivid testament to the shifting landscape of contemporary art. From his formative years in post-war Berlin to becoming a visionary figure in the flux of artistic mediums, Mike Steiner shaped not just his own artistic vocabulary, but also the contours of Contemporary Arts Berlin. What happens when a painter’s search for new meaning transforms into a revolution of the moving image and performance? Steiner’s journey—rich with collaboration, innovation, and provocation—invites viewers to rediscover the pulse of contemporary creativity.

Mike Steiner’s oeuvre defies easy categorization. Emerging as a painter, he quickly questioned the limits of two-dimensional expression and gravitated toward experimental forms. His early abstract paintings, informed by the energetic currents of Berlin’s Kreuzberger Forum, indicated a young artist in restless dialogue with the times. Steiner rubbed shoulders with icons such as Georg Baselitz and Karl Horst Hödicke, exhibiting in Paris, Milan and Geneva, yet his urge to transgress boundaries would soon find its true outlet beyond the canvas.

The seismic shift in his career arrived in the early 1970s. Exposure to the New York avant-garde, steered by mentors like Lil Picard and Allan Kaprow, saw Steiner immersed in the realms of Fluxus, Performance Art, and multimedia experiment. What distinguished Steiner from his contemporaries—including Joseph Beuys and Marina Abramovi?—was his ability to serve as both participant and enabler: not only did he create, he also facilitated platforms for radical art forms to flourish in Germany.

His grand legacy arguably came to fruition with the foundation of the legendary Hotel Steiner and the Studiogalerie in Berlin. These spaces—likened to the famously avant-garde Chelsea Hotel—became a crucible for creative exchange. Artists such as Valie Export, Carolee Schneemann, Ulay, and even international guests from the Performing Arts circuit, passed through Steiner’s doors. Here, the line between gallery and laboratory blurred spectacularly. As a venue, the Studiogalerie fostered painting, live actions, and most disruptively, video art, transforming Berlin’s art world.

Artistically, Steiner was never content to rest within fixed confines. He experimented with Super-8 film, photography, copy art, Minimal Art, Hard Edge, and particularly video tape. His "Painted Tapes" became signature hybrids: painted canvas sections ‘digitally’ extended through video sequences, in a seamless blend of image and time. This pioneering approach positioned Mike Steiner as one of Europe’s earliest and most consistent champions of video as a legitimate art medium. Collating abstract paintings, ephemeral performance, and video installations in a prolific archive, Steiner shaped what is now a cornerstone of Contemporary Arts Berlin.

It was unsurprising, then, that Mike Steiner’s largest retrospective in 1999 at the Hamburger Bahnhof – Nationalgalerie der Gegenwart focused on the broad interplay of his media and provided a rare, panoramic view on how contemporary art forms intersect. The significance of assembling his entire video collection—a gesture that placed it in the public trust of the Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz—cannot be overstated. This milestone not only affirmed the institutional recognition of video art but also highlighted Steiner’s decisive position alongside internationally esteemed contemporaries such as Nam June Paik, Bill Viola, and Richard Serra.

In his prolific curatorial and artistic phases, Steiner engaged directly with luminaries including Allan Kaprow (father of the Happening), Ulay (in the notorious 1976 action at the Neue Nationalgalerie), and other key figures from the fluxus and performance circuits. His documentation of Marina Abramovi?’s legendary "Freeing the Body" or the infamous art action with Ulay (“Irritation – Da ist eine kriminelle Berührung in der Kunst”) laid essential foundations for understanding the ephemeral essence of performing arts within contemporary artistic discourse.

While Mike Steiner’s strengths lay in technical innovation and cross-disciplinary vision, it is his persistent inquiry into the aesthetics of space, temporality, and human intervention that captivates. His work invited viewers not merely to observe, but to experience shifts in perception. The movement from painting to video was never a rejection but an enrichment—a way to give abstraction rhythm, color movement, and the fleeting present a tangible trace. Steiner’s Painted Tapes and late abstract paintings play with light, saturation, and optical vibration, offering what his peers might call an ‘electronic sublime.’

The broader context of Steiner’s impact emerges clearly in the history of Contemporary Arts Berlin. He was a key force behind the introduction of international performance and video to a German audience, not only as an artist but as organizer, collector, and public intellectual. His pioneering work as a curator—most notable in the TV format Videogalerie (1985–1990)—gave hundreds of works and dozens of artists a platform, democratizing and archiving an art that was otherwise destined to disappear. The resonance of his collection continues today, albeit with much of it still awaiting full digitization and re-exhibition.

In the twilight of his career—and after overcoming profound illness—Mike Steiner returned to painting, focusing on abstract compositions and textile works. These late pieces, marked by a distinct serenity and lush handling of surface, round out an already expansive legacy. For newcomers and connoisseurs alike, the sheer variety of Steiner’s output—abstract paintings, conceptual installations, collecting, and art activism—sets him apart from fellow German artists such as Georg Baselitz, Joseph Beuys, and Sigmar Polke, while linking him in spirit to trailblazers like Nam June Paik, Allan Kaprow, or Bill Viola.

What, then, renders Mike Steiner’s legacy so vital for new generations? It is the interplay of relentless experimentation and deep-rooted intellectual curiosity. Steiner’s art is never prescriptive, always exploratory: a blueprint for today’s contemporary artists navigating multiple media and blurred disciplines. The enduring relevance of his video works and installations, now housed in collections such as the Hamburger Bahnhof, demonstrates how contemporary art thrives on both risk and reflection.

For anyone eager to experience the pulse of Contemporary Arts Berlin—past, present and future—a dive into Mike Steiner’s archive is both inspiration and provocation. His life’s work offers more than just a historical footnote: it is an ongoing invitation to join the conversation about what art can be. For deeper exploration, visit the official artist website at www.mike-steiner.de – The official website of Mike Steiner and encounter images, texts, and a chronicle of exhibitions which continue to shape the discourse of contemporary art.