31. ROHKUNSTBAU

Artists:

Silvina Der Meguerditchian (ARM/ARG), Klaus Elle (D), Denise Flamme (D), Andros Foros (CZ), Matthias Garff (D), Christina Glanz (D), Johan Grimonprez (B), Manaf Halbouni (SYR/D), Erez Israeli (IL), Jörg Mandernach (GER), Tra My Nguyen (VIE), Viktor Petrov (BUL), Paloma Varga Weisz (HUN/GER), Kateřina Vincourová (CZ), Ulrich Vogl (GER), Anne Wenzel (NL/GER).

ROHKUNSTBAU—the name stands for international exhibitions of contemporary art in Brandenburg. World-class artists from numerous countries engage in a dialogue with the historic architecture of the Brandenburg castle through their works, thereby opening up new perspectives and ways of viewing the present.

The 31st ROHKUNSTBAU explores the “art of transgression” and asks: What is the new? And how does it come into the world? This year’s exhibition explores the possibilities and limits of transforming the existing. It focuses on the perspective of those acting within a pre-structured order—in short, on the logic of transcending the given to arrive at something new.

At the same time, the 31st ROHKUNSTBAU will fuel legitimate doubts as to whether everything that is new is necessarily better, thereby putting modernity’s paradigm of progress to the test. For does change toward something new necessarily mean progress? Or is change perhaps simply, quite banally, the result of moving beyond the given toward a different state? How, then, should this “other” be evaluated? And would it necessarily be new?

The 31st ROHKUNSTBAU focuses on social change, on maneuvers to overcome interpersonal boundaries and barriers and the creation of new interactive relationships and forms of cooperation, on technological innovations such as artificial intelligence, and, last but not least, on artistic strategies for overcoming traditional habits of seeing and hearing. The 31st ROHKUNSTBAU asks: What constitutes the “art of transgression”?