Yane Calovski, Hristina Ivanoska, Gergely László,
Nóra Lukács, Katarina Šević, Sonya Schönberger
Opening: 22 November, from 7pm,
Zsolt Sőrés – MUT NAQ FO MUS (IC) sound performance 8pm
Exhibition: 23 November 2024 – 28 February 2025
Opening hours: Tuesdays and fridays 11am-3pm or by appointment: 0176 618 133 03 or mailto@after-the-butcher.de
The Seeker is doomed to wander, albeit not to some final destination. The Seeker’s attention is dedicated to the journey itself and navigation tactics. Along the way, the Seeker gathers information, orientates, deconstructs, and rearranges the imprints of the present, filters out the superfluous, the false, the deceptive, what is influenced by specific interests, what is untrue or what seems even more real than reality itself. Although the Seeker orientates securely in the present, their knowledge and the decision-making mechanisms that help them to orient themselves cannot be preserved for the future in any other form than a set of empty rites. What will be gleaned from these defunct movements and rituals? And will the Seekers of the future be able to read their pasts? How can we ‘present’ people contribute to this?
Developed as an episodic installation that will unfold through three iterations, punctuated by public events, On Seeking aims to acknowledge Berlin’s critical artistic community and dialogue in a state of uncertainty marked by the disintegration of social structures, the crisis of counterculture or the erosion of solidarity. The project gathers artists in Berlin who share a background in the (post-)socialist context as well as research-based practice, reflecting on images of the future shaped by a possible dystopia: a reality in which certainty has disappeared and consensus on knowledge, facts and historical narratives has disintegrated.
The project is about embracing the fluidity of artistic inquiry, emphasizing the value of process over the formality of presentation, turning the exhibition space into a site of ongoing collective experimentation, spontaneous and responsive artistic practice and dialogue. Alongside research-driven approaches, the presented works and performances attempt to reinterpret and reimagine archival material and biographies, to (re)archive the ephemeral, the discarded, the waste of history or archival waste and to address practices of remembrance, while reflecting on the act of seeking itself.
From November 2024 to February 2025, a temporary collective will take over the running of After the Butcher. Over the course of three months, the exhibition space will unfold as an evolving, altering, morphing installation in which individual works will be replaced and repositioned, with performances and screenings inserted, refocusing the initial constellation and keeping the dialogue fluid and ongoing.
After the Butcher – exhibition space for contemporary art & social issues – Spittastr. 25 – D-10317 Berlin
https://www.sonyaschoenberger.de/
https://www.zilbermangallery.com/yane-calovski-a447.html