Solo Exhibition ACC

Kopfüberleben (Upsidedownlife)

Solo Exhibition
ACC Gallery Weimar
2021

Click HERE for a virtual 3D walk through the exhibition.
See below for a guided tour.

Kopfüberleben (Upsidedownlife) in the twenty-two rooms of the ACC Gallery explores biographical narratives brought into sharp focus by being diagnosed with a life-threatening illness. Developed during two years of recovery and healing, the artworks reveal intimate testimonies of fragility and resilience. They provide not only a glimpse into the subjective experience of dwelling near death but an attempt to gain an insight into the essence of life. What can be learned from a journey through a life-threatening illness? How do we narrate our illness and suffering? How do we transform personal life experience into knowledge that becomes part of collective memory?

In the exhibition, extracts from a personal diary during my time of treatment are used to form a narrative thread on the walls leading to stop-motion films, photographs, objects, sculptures, drawings, audio pieces, and installations. The artworks visualize the paradoxical, absurd and often existential elements of a life turned upside down, in which emotions and thoughts become incomprehensible. The viewer is invited to reflect on their own bodily knowledge and experiences of isolation during the global pandemic. Storytelling and narrative are explored to consider how we tell stories, and how we write the scripts of our life. Censorship, self-censorship, repetition, iteration, and meaning of stories connect with biographical literature, and art history to place the personal beyond the self.

The participatory installation Unlearning Learned Nonuse (above) invites visitors to unlearn how to draw as a mirror forces one to draw from a reflection with their non-dominant hand. This mirror therapy experience focuses
one back to the body and a slow relearning of seeing
and drawing. is taking place.

I Become Us (below) in the adjoining room is a fictional chorus of cardboard figures each with a distinct basic sound and body organ. Language is broken down to an A sound reminding us of the fragility of the body and our self-awareness only when something goes wrong.

The Stop Motion Film I Feel Like Home, It Feels Like Home (below) is a personal dialogue between the artist’s absent and present body. Produced with still images over two years of recovery, the visual narrative is based on body gestures with fictitious organs and morphing of body parts that appear and disappear. A narration, at times dissolving language, connects the two separated selves and weaves together a fictional sense of connection through time.

Exhibition tour with Yvonne Buchheim

The exhibition was funded by the NEUSTART KULTUR Module D of the Deutscher Künstlerbund. An art book on body knowledge and biographical narration will be published in 2022 with funding from the Kulturstiftung Thüringen and VG Bild-Kunst in Bonn.