Psychonauts, provenance and personal stories

Nazi-looted art, video works and an artist who works across different media: From March 7, three very different art exhibitions will be running in parallel at the Berlinische Galerie. Many of the exhibits come from the gallery's collection and have rarely or never been part of an exhibition before. The feature film COWWIDINOK (2015) by John Bock (*1965) and the installation Twins (2009) by Heiner Franzen (*1960) will be shown for the first time in Psychonauts. John Bock and Heiner Franzen. The two artists examine the human psyche and its hidden sides in enigmatic video works. Like psychonauts, literally sailors of the soul, they venture into the unknown of the soul with the aim of finding answers to all-encompassing questions of human life. Psychonauts. John Bock and Heiner Franzen ends on August 11.

With Käthe Kruse. It's All Good Now, the Berlinische Galerie is presenting a variety of artworks that are closely linked to the artist's biography. Käthe Kruse (*1958), who became known in the 1980s as a member of the collective »Die Tödliche Doris« (The Deadly Doris), uses personal experiences and everyday objects to ascribe new meanings to familiar structures. In her installations, she often mixes a wide variety of media. However, Kruse also addresses social issues such as domestic violence, abortion and war in her multifaceted oeuvre. This exhibition ends on June 16.

The third show is dedicated to an aspect that has become increasingly important for museums in recent decades: provenance research. The ownership history of a work of art is a central component of its reception. In Provenances. Wayfaring Art, the Berlinische Galerie is showing almost 40 rarely exhibited paintings with extensive explanations of research findings and gaps in knowledge. The history of Fidus' Temple Dance of the Soul (1910) serves as an example of successful research work: the painting-cycle was only identified as Nazi-looted art in 2017 on the basis of a handwritten note by the artist on a postcard. After intensive research, the paintings were restituted and then legally reacquired by the Berlinische Galerie at the market price. The exhibition Provenances. Wayfaring Art has the longest duration and closes on October 13.