I nodded in agreement when I first read this e-flux note by Anselm Franke (first published in German in Monopol). And yes, I am back talking about documenta but only peripherally. We are witnessing old structures, not wanting to die. Yeah, we are! Fuck them old structures, not wanting to die. I pressed like. But then this phrase (and the fact that I keep hearing it lately) stuck in my head like a popcorn flake between my teeth. We are witnessing old structures not wanting to die. Old structures don't want to die, and we sit there and witness them. I think I have now come to consider this phrase as a gatekeeping signal. I mean… George Floyd didn't want to die. Mahsa Amini didn't want to die; the list is very long. Victims' agency over their fate is, by default, eliminated by the perpetrator. So the main thing that annoys me about this phrase is that it grants an agency to the victim ( in this case, "old structures") while rendering the perpetrator ( in this case, "We") to a passive role that of a witness. Kind of reverse gaslighting. In other words: We shouldn't be witnessing old structures wanting or not wanting anything because we should be too busy killing them.
He then moves on to distinguish between a speculative art market (bad guys) and the art world of publicly funded institutions ( good guys??). The two systems are heavily and often harmonically intertwined, of course, not to mention the merit and independence of "publicly funded" institutions heavily depend on where the government lies on the democracy scale. For example, take The Milk of Dreams, a very successful curatorial undertaking celebrated for a list of majority Queer, Female, and BIPOC artists. A peak under the hood will reveal that more than half of these artists are dead. And then you can link to the mega galleries that have recently taken over their estates—a symbiosis!
The biggest tell is, of course, the use of the words Star Curator. In a community-driven system, authorship is secondary; curators, let alone “star” curators or any “stars,” are obsolete. Just saying.
THIS WEEK
Wed Oct 5th, 18 at Galerie im Turm: A LYING SUN Anna Mirkin & Katharina Trudzinski
opening with DJ-Set: David Pearl
Upon entering Galerie im Turm, the exhibition space appears to expand beyond its walls rendering visible the massive columns of the so-called working class palaces of Karl-Marx- Allee. At every hour of the day, during the progression of the chilly autumn months, the columns are bathed in the warm light of what turns out to a lying sun – one that shines but gives no warmth.
A Lying Sun is a collaboration between Almacén Gallery and Galerie im Turm. The continuation of the exhibition will be shown at Almacén in March 2023.
Curated by Yolandé Gouws and Helen-Sophie Mayr
Axel Obiger is celebrating the 150th show anniversary! LEFT WINTER is a composer and contemporary visual & sound artist. Based in Manchester and Berlin, his work spans sound and images that navigate the transitional area of music, science + art. For the show OPEN END, which is the 150th exhibition at Axel Obiger, LEFT WINTER composes a sound piece that corresponds with the ideas of Petra Karadimas’ and Gabriele Künne’s work.
Thu, 6 Oct 20h at LSD Erotikmarkt Gender Bender Time Traveller: Queer Art from the Future
with Stacie Ant | Serwah Attafuah | Bob Bottle | Danielle Brathwaite-Shirley | Face3D - Chong Yan Chuah | Amir Fattal | Frederik Heyman | Andrew Thomas Huang | Huntrezz Janos | Sasha Katz | Bahareh Khoshooee | Jabu Nadia Newman | OneFallArt | Dennis Rudolph | Nicole Ruggiero and Sam Clover | Vincent Schwenk | Georgie Roxby Smith | Jam Sutton | Miyö Van Stenis | Mathias Vef | Xemantic
GENDER BENDER TIME TRAVELLER is the world’s first queer exhibition journey between universe and metaverse, with a diverse group of 21 world-renowned artists challenging our perception of gender, sexuality, race, and culture. With works ranging from metaverse landscapes to hybrid avatars and VR sex clubs, boundaries between human, art, and machine are being collapsed to redefine digital art for the next generation.
Organized by Geisted.
on view 6 Oct-30 Oct -opening hours: Tue-Wed. 2 - 9 pm, Thu-Sun 12 - 7 pm
LSD Erotikmarkt
Kurfürstenstraße 151
Berlin-Tiergarten
Fri Oct 7th, 20h at Eigen Art Lab Discussion Judith Prokasky and Philipp Oswalt
On occasion of Esper Postma’s solo exhibition “Doppelgängers” a public discussion between Judith Prokasky and Philipp Oswalt, moderated by Esper Postma.
Judith Prokasky is a cultural scientist, curator and writer. She currently leads the program “The Palace of the Republic is Present” at the Humboldt Forum. Formerly, she was curator of the department “History of the Site” in the same institution. Prokasky is the author of numerous books, such as “Mythos der Revolution: Karl Liebknecht, das Berliner Schloss und der 9. November 1918”.
Philipp Oswalt is an architect and scholar. He is known as a public voice in debates about architecture and public space. For instance, as the founder and editor of the online fora schlossdebatte.de and lernort-garnisonkirche.de. Oswalt is a professor of Architectural theory at the Kassel University.
October 9th, 15-17h at einbuchhaus: Framing Spaces Finissage
Na Kim & Liam Gillick, Goldin+Senneby, Seung-hye Hong, Young-gyu Jang, Jidon Jeong, Jin and Park, Hyunseon Kang, Daum Kim, Markus Miessen, Dokho Shin, Hyunjoon Yoo
'Framing Spaces' is an exhibition that presents various conceptions and interpretations of space as the framework for art accumulated over the course of three years. It is also a curatorial experiment with different exhibition formats: online, printed material, and offline. Following the online exhibition Your Floorplan (2020) and the newspaper exhibition 'Framing Floorplans' (2021), 'Framing Spaces' is situated in a tangible gallery and continues to examine the ways in which art is recontextualized, perceived, experienced, and interacted with through different framings. The exhibition shows a new body of works by Na Kim, inspired by the artworks of the participating artists, designers, architects, writer, and musician in the two previous exhibitions.
* Artist, Na Kim will be present.
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Curator: Hyunjoo Byeon hyunjoobyeon, Na Kim @nananananananakim
Exhibition Designer: Dokho Shin @shindokho
einBuch.haus
Florastr. 61,
13187 Berlin - Pankow
ONGOING
Wednesdays, 5.30pm–7pm: Every Wednesday, there is an opportunity to meet and talk with individual artists.
Further events:
Tuesday, 18 October 8pm – 10 pm: Tender Reels: Film screening and talk (free admission)
Filmrauschpalast Moabit, Lehrter Str. 35, 10557 Berlin
until 29.Oct at thx again: UMRISSENE WELTEN- An exhibition by Saïdou Dicko
The upcoming exhibition at ARTCO Galery Berlin sets Saïdou Dicko‘s (born 1979 in Burkina Faso) early photographic work in the context of his latest digital collages. Now living and working in Paris, Dicko creates a world of lyrical storytelling in which people are far more than just shadows. Instead, the artist hands out an invitation to engage with the characters on a deeper level, to put yourself in their place, and to enter his contoured universe.
with Michael Buthe, Nadine Fecht, Gerhard Hoehme, Elmira Iravanizad, Lucia Kempkes, Miriam Salamander, Jan Voss. The Title cccc stands for collect-cut-compose-cobble. Four adjectives that describe the creation process of collages.
The exhibition takes place at both locations.
Galerie Georg Nothelfer, Corneliusstraße 3
Showroom Galerie Georg Nothelfer, Grolmanstraße 28
DITTRICH & SCHLECHTRIEM is pleased to present the first solo show in Berlin by KEITH BOADWEE (b. 1961, Meridian, Mississippi, USA; lives and works in Emeryville, California, USA). Portrait subjects -frogs, poodles, and fish- are depicted in multi-planer dimensions, posed and peering through cocktail glasses, prisms, and fish bowls, geometrically divided, multiplied, and reflected. The new artworks have evolved now into a realm of spiritual abstraction. On the occasion of the exhibition, the gallery will produce and publish a catalog of the works with a new essay from David Rimanelli, in German and English, available in September 2022.
