Made in Berlin
Curated by: Birgit Hoffmeister
The Rethymnon Centre for Contemporary Art (today’s Museum of Contemporary Art of Crete) which used to operate with the support of the Ministry of Culture and the Municipality of Rethymnon, within the framework of the national Cultural Network, organized from 18 September to 6 December 1998 at the “L. Kanakakis” Municipal Gallery premises, the exhinition MADE IN BERLIN – A new generation of artists.
The exhibition realized after an invitation addressed by the Board and Director of the Centre, Maria Marangou, to Birgit Hoffmeister, Berlin.
Ms. Hoffmeister had the idea as well as the curatorial responsibility of the exhibition.
The exhibition Made in Berlin, presented nine artists who work and reside in Berlin: Gunda Forster, Hans Hemmert, Sabine Hornig, York der Knofel, Antjie Majewski, Michel Majerus, Olaf Nicolai, Manfred Pernice and Daniel Richter, participate in the exhibition with works from various media such as painting, photography, object, slide projection, video and installation, offering an insight into contemporary artistic activity in Berlin.
Over the past several years, an interesting movement in the young Berlin art scene could be observed. A new generation of artists has been emerging, one which is intent on making a significant contribution to the art dialogue of our time. Young art critics, newly founded galleries as well as young collectors were accompanying this breakthrough with committed involvement. This new generation of artists in Berlin reflected the life and the sensibilities of a city which, in the nineties had gone through one of the easily most rapid processes of change and development in Germany, you might even say in Europe in its whole.
“Made in Berlin” offered for the first time abroad the possibility to gain insight into the lively and many-faceted Berlin art scene.
The exhibited works described the artistic climate in Berlin. It is at one and the same time experimental and visionary; its inspiration was due in part to the continuous change the city had been subjected to. Instinctively, this art was involved in the aesthetic and political discourse and poses a challenge to the viewer to enter the dialogue.
The exhibition accompanied by a four-coloured bilingual catalogue, in Greek and German, which besides an extensive and informative illustration section, offered, through the texts by Peter Herbstreuth, Ulmann Matthias Hakerts, Thomas Irmer, Ingo Niermann, Roberto Ohrt, Anja Osswald, Anne Schmedding, Susanne Titz, Thilo Wermke, an insight into the environment of these nine artists as well as to their different way of thinking and expressing.
The exhibition had been made possible through the generous support of the Ministry of Science, Research and Culture (Senatsverwaltung fur Wissenschaft, Forschung und Kultur), in Berlin as well as of the Goethe Institute in Athens and Chania-Crete.
Lloyd’s of London - G. Karavias & Associates, substantially supported the annual programme of the Centre, by offering the insurance coverage of the works.
The artists participating as well as personalities from the art and media world of Germany had been invited to attend the opening of the exhibition in Rethymnon.
Through the duration of the exhibition, guided tours for children and adults will be scheduled, along with educational programmes and seminars. All the above are part of all exhibition’s concurrent activities.
From 12 to 30 January 1999, “Made in Berlin” was presented at the House of Cyprus in Athens.
