Kontrollillusion

About

The visual worlds of Miriam Böhm, Nadja Bournonville, Jürgen Klauke, Patricia Köllges, Tilman Peschel, Johanna Reich and Benjamin Verhoeven centre on (human) bodies as a performative, sculptural or dissolving motif. At the same time, the artists’ reflexive formal approaches focus attention on the way media images themselves are made.

In her photographic series, Miriam Böhm (born 1972) shows complex and varied compositions of objects between two- and three-dimensionality that cause picture surfaces to appear as constructed spaces.

In »Blindfell«, Nadja Bournonville (born 1983) addresses the possibilities of visual perception. The viewer’s gaze meets with the staged loss of sight of her figures, who reveal a different, unusual form of interior view.

Since the early 1970s, Jürgen Klauke (born 1943) has been experimenting with self-portrayal, staging his body as a surface for the projection of various models of identity and gender – a radical gesture with which he still questions society’s conventional ideals.

The title of »Stalemates« by Patricia Köllges (born 1971) refers to the deadlock between the protagonists of her photographs and the position of the viewer. With minimal gestures and modified clothes, ›the living sculptures‹ on a plinth expose the constructed nature of identity.

»Pegel« (Level) by Tilmann Peschel (born 1976) shows images of a heavily fragmented body between figuration and abstraction. The level of the white liquid surrounding the sitter determines the degree to which individual body parts and limbs are visible.

The video installation »Black Hole« by Johanna Reich (born 1977), part of a larger work entitled »The Presence of Absence«, stages the visual merging of the protagonist with her surroundings, which appear as an abstract backdrop.

The animated film »50.000 Scans« by Benjamin Verhoeven (born 1990) consists of scanned moving images. By unmasking technical procedures and traces, it underlines the manipulative dimension of time and human body movement in the image.

Tamara Lorenz (born 1972) studied under Jürgen Klauke at the Academy of Media Arts in Cologne. She sees photography as a concentrated spatial medium that brings together performance, painting, drawing and sculpture.