MENAGERIE

MENAGERIE

Reinhard Berg, Peter Bernhard, Wolfgang Blanke, Susan Geel, Amador Vallina

18. May to June 23, 2018

"Menagerie" is the title of the latest art exhibition at the H22 gallery. However, this does not mean, as is commonly used, the animal show at a circus or zoo, but rather, in a broader sense, a collection of curious figures. The exhibiting artists deal with this topic in different ways.

 

Amador Vallina, known as the floating screed, is not only a painter and sculptor, but also a puppeteer. The marionettes he designed and built depict bizarre characters such as homeless aliens, self-absorbed poets, hypersensitive fantasy creatures, extremely secret spies, tough musclemen, extremely delicate princesses, unscrupulous criminals, intellectual and disheveled professors; all picturesque figures with strong expression and stage presence.

 

Another highlight of the exhibition is the photo series "Circus Backstage" by the well-known Wiesbaden photographer Reinhard Berg. The photos take us directly into circus life behind the scenes. And they touch us with their unaffected authenticity and honesty. You can sense that the artist is also working with autobiographical elements here: Reinhard Berg, the son of a tightrope walker, spent his childhood in the Althoff Circus until he was five years old, and he now returns to this theme in his later work.

 

In keeping with the theme, Wolfgang Blanke is exhibiting paintings in his masterful painting technique, which, similar to Impressionism, focuses on the change in local color through light, shadow and atmosphere.

Another artist, Peter Bernhard, shows fantastically exuberant images of creatures and animals of all kinds in his expressive acrylic paintings.

The exhibition is complemented by Susan Geel's sculptures. They are busts of female figures with strange, partly stepped attachments on their heads, which seem familiar and yet strangely alien.

 

“Perspectives – The Adventures of the Floating Floor”.

9. March to April 21, 2018

The floating screed was the inspiration for the next exhibition at GALERIE H22. As the title suggests, the artists are using visual means to address the topic of architecture. Reinhard Berg and Ditta Krebs are showing architectural photography of a somewhat different kind, Wolfgang Blanke, Julia Bernhard and Amador Vallina are approaching the topic with painting, and Susan Geel is complementing the exhibition with terracotta works.

Can the screed float and is it adventurous? Does it fill it with pride or disgust when we walk over it? We will never be able to grasp its essence using normal categories. We can therefore look forward to the exhibition in which the artists deal with the metaphysics of architecture.

"Art and Texts"

19. January to March 3, 2018

Reinhard Berg, Peter Bernhard, Wolfgang Blanke, Ditta Krebs, Amador Vallina and Angelika Wende

 

Does art need texts? Does it need words? Aren't works of art carriers of information that can function without words? Can a text make a work of art understandable, expand on it, counteract it or even destroy it? Does a text have the same power as an image? Is there a mutually dependent relationship?

These are the questions that interest the exhibition organizers. They experiment with the juxtaposition of art and texts and select texts for their works: prose and poetry, classical, modern, their own and other people's texts.

We are looking forward to an exciting dialogue between art and text and to the reading:

“Dot, dot, comma, dash – The art of talking about art ... or better not?”

Reading by: Angelika Wende, painter, author & speaker and Dirk Arlt, director & actor.