after the butcher, showroom for contemporary art and social issues is run by the artist Thomas Kilpper together with Franziska Böhmer since 2006 in their house, a former butcher’s shop, and from 2015 to end of January 2022 in collaboration with the artist Ina Wudtke.
after the butcher, showroom for contemporary art and social issues has been run by Berlin artist Thomas Kilpper together with Franziska Böhmer since 2006 in the shop of the former Merkel butchery. From 2015 to 2021 in collaboration with the artist Ina Wudtke. Since 2022, Alice Creischer and Andreas Siekmann have joined the curatorial team.
The house at Spittastraße 25 was built between 1870 and 1875 as one of the first concrete buildings in Europe. At that time, around 60 dwellings made of slag concrete were built in the small neighbourhood – Viktoriastadt. It was an early experiment in sustainable and ecological building: slag, a waste product from the steel production of the nearby “Knorr-Bremsen” factory, was recycled, mixed with cement and tamped into approx. 70cm high formwork: a building material with amazingly good physical insulating properties. Today, only six of these houses still exist, which are listed and under ensemble protection due to their new and experimental construction method.
In the 1960s, the ground floor was converted into a butcher’s shop with a shop door facing the street, framed by two large shop windows. During and until shortly after the GDR, about 15 employees worked here and in the rear building, processing up to 20 tonnes of meat a week and producing all kinds of sausage products for the canteens of various VEBs. Then the house stood empty for a few years…
after the butcher is a project space by artists for artists and at the same time open to people interested in art from all social groups. We ask those we invite to an exhibition to develop a project for this space. The exhibition space is intended to offer young or lesser-known artists, in combination with more established positions, an opportunity and platform to present their work in a non-commercial setting. Our focus is on artistic strategies that critically reflect social issues and social contradictions.