ZYKLISCH

WerkStadt Exhibition at kunstraum t27

Opening: Thursday, May 22, 2015, 7:30 PM

Sunday, June 21, 2015, 7:30 PM Closing and Artist Talk

Opening Hours: Wednesday to Sunday from 3:00 PM to 7:00 PM

The WerkStadt cultural association, in cooperation with Kunstverein Neukölln, presents a group exhibition at kunstraum t27. The exhibiting artists all live and/or work in Neukölln's Körnerkiez. With the high caliber of their artistic output and their diverse approaches, they enrich the artistic landscape of Körnerkiez. The exhibition cyclically presents a snapshot of their current work to the public:

The periodic, the recurring, the cycle of becoming and passing away—these are themes that artistic creation has grappled with since time immemorial. Inspired by the life cycle that every being undergoes, fascinated by the relentless reordering of things as well as their inevitable decay, and drawn to the motif of the circle, which can be found as a geometric figure in all areas of life and science, artists have engaged with the theme of the cyclical.

In our exhibition, we aim to bring together various artists who explore the theme of the cyclical in their work: from paintings to sculptures to sound installations, a wide range of artistic approaches is represented.

The exhibition is divided into two aspects of the cyclical: while the first part focuses on the concrete theme of the life cycle of becoming and passing away, the second part takes a more abstract approach. The central motif here is the recurring, expressed as an underlying circular or periodic structure:

Janine Hönig explores through her art the microorganisms that are essential for the beginning of any life on Earth. By presenting bacteria and microbes on an oversized scale, the artist makes the invisible visible, highlighting the central role these microorganisms play in the cycle of life. Alice Baillaud engages with the passion that precedes the emergence of a living being. Her sensual yet abstract works capture the simple beauty of a new life beginning. Kristina Berning's sculptural works intensely investigate their own materiality—her piece columna vertebralis, for instance, embodies the spine, which represents the framework of life from birth to death, and reflects on its own statics. The large-scale paintings by Sergio Frutos address transience, death, and what remains afterward, exploring various animal skulls with photographic precision and meticulousness.

Mara Diener's abstract works evoke associations with an explosion, whose dissolving moment of destruction could simultaneously represent—the way a Big Bang does—the beginning of a new order... Morten Stræde adds a historical-political component to the cyclical, recognizing the periodicity and recurrence of historical motifs and political figures, juxtaposing them through an intriguing montage of death portraits and political icons. Finally, Douglas Henderson introduces a mystically absurd world with his sound sculpture Hexenkreis, which, on one hand, self-reflectively winks at the artist's own rotating activity, while on the other hand, its circular motion can evoke an almost hypnotic effect.

Artists: Alice Baillaud, Kristina Berning, Mara Diener, Sergio Frutos, Douglas Henderson, Janine Hönig, Morten Stræde

The exhibition is supported as part of the project "Culture for All Generations."