Top 5 Exhibitions February 2018

Exhibitions 

Top 5 Exhibitions February 2018

The month starts with an amazing mix of art experiences. You can visit Frankfurt and see more than 100 works from Basquiat, or drive yourself to Kommunale Galerie in Berlin and observe how 23 photographers understand cars. Yes, cars! Also currently in the city on display are the paintings from Armin Stern, and a monumental music and light installation as part of the CTM Festival 2018. And don’t forget: February has only 28 days, so hurry up!

Jean-Michel Basquiat, Dos Cabezas, 1982, Acrylic and oil stick on canvas with wooden supports, Private collection, © VG Bild-Kunst Bonn, 2018 & The Estate of Jean-Michel Basquiat. Licensed by Artestar, New York

Schirn Kunsthalle // Basquiat: Boom for real

 16th February – 27th May

Featuring more than 100 works from Jean-Michel Basquiat, the exhibition in Frankfurt explores the artist journey from his political graffiti, aka SAMO©, made when he was only 17-years-old with his friend Al Diaz, to film, music and works like Untitled (1980). The two meters high metal sheet and spray-painted “NEWYORK NEWAVE” is one of the works presented at P.S. 1 New York/New Wave, which are, for the first time since their original display, brought back together at Schirn. Alongside paintings, drawings, rare films, photographs, and archive material, the show has assembled a selection of notebooks with poems, sketches, quotations, and addresses. Like a diary and inspirational archive from the youngest participant in history of Documenta in 1982 and close friend of Andy Warhol. The exhibition is curated by Barbican Centre, London, in cooperation with Schirn Kunsthalle.

Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt: Römerberg 6, 60311, Frankfurt am Main

Beni Bischof o. T. (Handicapped Cars), 2014

Beni Bischof o. T. (Handicapped Cars), 2014

Kommunale Galerie  // Drive Drove Driven

Until  8th April

Freedom, sex, power, design, innovation , but also traffic jam and pollution. There are so many (positive and negative) aspects and considerations to be made about cars that probably Matthias Harder, the curator from the show “Drive Drove Driven”, didn’t have a problem to find interesting interpretations and artistic approaches about the topic. Images of accidents and empty streets, of abandoned and deteriorating cars, of vintage car rallies are some of the more than 60 shots from 23 photographers presented in Berlin. A conceptual exhibition to be seen while on your headphones Iggy Pop sings “I am a passenger and I ride and I ride…”!

Kommunale Galerie: Hohenzollerndamm 176, 10713, Berlin

Armin Stern, Luna Park auf Coney Island, 1939, Öl auf Leinwand, 54 x 64 cm Nachlass Armin Stern, Berlin Foto: Gerhard Haug, Berlin Bildrechte: © 2018, Anita Lochner, Berlin

Kunsthaus Dahlem // Armin Stern – Zionist, Grenzgänger, Kosmopolit

Until  12th March

The Kunsthaus Dahlem features for the first time in Berlin, 30 oil and watercolor paintings and sketches from different creative phases of Armin Stern as part of the exhibition “New / Old Homeland. R/emigration of artists after 1945”. Born in 1883 in Galánta, Slovakia, the painter made portraits of academic and political celebrities, like Thomas Mann, Albert Einstein and David Ben-Gurion, and was also famous for his social criticism and Old Testament related themes as well as landscapes. Between French impressionism and German expressionism, his work was notably  influenced by the cities he lived in, like Paris, Frankfurt and Munich, where he studied. Because of the Nazi regime, which banned and confiscated his works, he fled to New York in 1938. He died in 1944.

Kunsthaus Dahlem: Käuzchensteig 8, 14195, Berlin

cellF Performance

Kunstraum Kreuzberg/Bethanien // Uncanny Valleys of a Possible Future 

Until 4th April 2018

With a strong political approach, the CTM 2018 exhibition “Uncanny Valleys of a Possible Future”  presents works from Frédérick A. Belzile, Guy Ben-Ary, Jessica Ekomane, Peter Flemming, Lawrence Lek, Teun Vonk, Anne de Vries, ,Zorka Wollny & Andrzej Wasilewski and ZULI. The festival theme „Turmoil“ is explored in a way that each artist addresses the disruption and controversy of our time and proposes how to deal with polarities, such as tension/explosion, apathy/engagement, regression/progress, peril/hope. There is also a clear connection with technology. In the work “cellF“,  Guy Ben Ary uses his own neurons to form the living brain of “the world’s first human synthesizer”. The aim is to represents a radical new way to think about what a musical instrument can be and how music can be made. More infos: www.ctm-festival.de

Kunstraum Kreuzberg/Bethanien:  Mariannenplatz 2, 10997, Berlin

SKALAR Christopher Bauder Kangding Ray

SKALAR Christopher Bauder and Kangding Ray

Kraftwerk Berlin // Skalar

Until 25th February

Measuring 45m in length, 20m in width, and 10m in height, the installation SKALAR encompasses a synchronous interplay of 65 kinetic mirrors, 90 moving lights, and a multichannel sound system. The work by artist Christopher Bauder and the musician Kangding Ray and explores the impact of light and sound on human perception. Here, light is treated as a solid material, which is sculpted and shaped, and, as consequence, could produce emotional associations. You can expect to feel surprise, exhilaration or anticipation, for example. SKALAR is a collaboration with the CTM Festival 2018, too. Four live performances are schedule on the 4th and 24th February.

Kraftwerk Berlin: Köpenicker Str. 70, 10179, Berlin

Author: Maíra Goldschmidt