From Saturday, 17 August 2024, Schloss Sacrow near Potsdam is presenting the exhibition GEGEN DEN STRICH (Against the grain) with works by 22 international artists from Generation Z. How are the lifestyles and values of this first, globally connected generation of ‘digital natives’ expressed in art and how do they differ from the older millennials and boomers? The exhibition opens with a vernissage on Friday, 16 August 2024 from 6 pm. Curator-led tours will be offered during the exhibition (see dates below). Schloss Sacrow and the nearby Heilandskirche church are nestled in the park area designed by Peter Joseph Lenné (1789-1866).
Image above: Elisa Breyer, What I ate in a week during Bürgergeld, 2024
Generation Z comprises the cohorts born between the mid-1990s and 2012. Around 140 works by 22 Gen Z artists provide surprising insights into the emotional worlds and lifestyles of the first globally networked generation of ‘digital natives’, who differ from the older millennials and boomers in terms of their values. The exhibition also illustrates how this generation of artists transfers their digital experiences and ways of seeing into the analogue art practice of painting, graphic art, photography and sculpture.
Participating artists
Emma Sarpaniemi – Photography (Helsinki)
Alexander Basil – Painting (Berlin)
Kensise Anders – photography & fabric paintings (Vienna)
Gustav Sonntag – Painting (Dresden)
Lili Marie Theilen – Painting (Frankfurt/Main)
Lilli Moors – film installation (Berlin)
Malwine Stauss – Ceramics & Painting (Berlin/Leipzig)
Lunita July Dorn – Painting (Berlin)
Kiriakos Tompolidis – Painting (Berlin)
Eileen Helm – Painting (Berlin)
Shanee Roe – Painting (Tel Aviv / Berlin)
Maja Behrmann – Sculpture (Leipzig)
Emilia Auersperg – Photography & Painting (London, UK)
Max Grote – Painting (Berlin)
Olasunkanmi Akomolehin – Painting (Lagos)
Elisa Breyer – Painting (Berlin)
Eileen Alamarales Noy – Photography & Performance (Camagüey/Halle)
Juno Rothaug – Painting (Hamburg)
Minh Phong Ngyuen – Painting (Vienna)
Katharina Stadler – Painting (Düsseldorf / Essen)
Sonya Rychkova – Painting (Offenbach)
Etsu Egami – Painting (Tokyo / New York)
Visitors can expect a broad spectrum of different modes of expression, styles and techniques with which young artists at German and foreign universities portray themselves and their surroundings today. Friendship and loneliness, diversity and physicality are some of the recurring themes in this year’s Ars Sacrow summer exhibition, in which numerous galleries and lenders are participating.
Expressive colourfulness, radical subjectivity, rough strokes and impulsive style as well as a humorous approach to artistic role models and pictorial traditions are some of the characteristics of the exhibition ‘Against the Grain’. The featured artists from different backgrounds, graduates of art colleges and academies, belong to a generation for whom categorisation according to art movements and nationalities, painting schools and styles only play a subordinate role and who move freely between abstraction and figuration.
Generational classifications often seem artificial and have been rightly criticised because they are primarily geared towards the social situations of western industrialised countries and neglect the socio-cultural conditions of young people in the global South, for example. However, the generational concept of sociologist Karl Mannheim (1893-1947) has taken on a new relevance with the so-called Generation Z: they are the first to grow up with the internet and have been shaped by it worldwide. The mental worlds of the ‘homo digitalis’ are becoming more and more similar and are reproducing each other through the increasing use of the same algorithms, cyberspaces, AI and robotics. This development has also long since occupied and influenced the arts and art theory, where analogue art practices and techniques now appear in a new light. The exhibited works can therefore also be seen as evidence of a new resilience and resistance to a world of digital imagery and media appropriation.
The exhibition is curated by Dr Dietmar Peikert and Michael M. Thoss, assistance: Leonie L Littkopf.
Catalogue
The exhibition is accompanied by a 128-page catalogue “GEGEN DEN STRICH – Gen Z in der Kunst” in German and English. Editors: Leonie-Louise Littkopf, Eva Morawietz, Dietmar Peikert, Michael M. Thoss. The catalogue is published by Heine Lenz Zizka Projekte GmbH, ISBN 978-3-00-079677-7, price: 20 EUR.
About Schloss Sacrow
Shortly after his accession to the throne in 1840, King Frederick William IV acquired the Sacrow estate in order to embellish the Potsdam garden landscape. At the same time, he had the Church of the Saviour built nearby in the form of an early Christian basilica according to plans by Ludwig Persius. Peter Joseph Lenné designed the surrounding park area. By converting the manor house into a palace, Frederick William IV completed the wreath of palaces and gardens around the Havellauf in Potsdam. After the Second World War, the palace complex suffered losses due to various uses. Since 2002, the palace with its charming views of the New Garden and the Marble Palace has been used as an event venue during the summer months. The exhibitions are organised by Ars Sacrow e.V., an association for the promotion of cultural heritage in Potsdam Sacrow.
WHEN?
Opening: Friday, 16. August 2024, 6 pm
Traditional double-decker buses will be travelling to and from Berlin for the vernissage on 16 August.
Outward journey to Sacrow from Spandau station, Seegefelder Str. at 5:00, 5:15, 6:15 and 6:45 pm.
Return journey to Spandau with a stop at Gatower Ecke Heerstr. from Sacrow from 10:00 pm every 30 minutes.
Exhibition period: Friday, 16. August – Sunday, 20. October 2024
Opening hours: Friday – Monday, 11 am – 6 pm
DATES?
Curator tours with Michael M. Thoss
Sunday, 18.08.2024, 3.00 pm
Friday, 06.09.2024, 3.00 pm
Friday, 13.09.2024, 3.00 pm
Friday, 20.09.2024, 3.00 pm
Friday, 27.09.2024, 3.00 pm
WHERE?
Schloss Sacrow
Krampnitzer Straße 33
14469 Potsdam
COSTS?
Admission 8 EUR, reduced 5 EUR
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