What can art achieve at a time when people are fleeing war and terror to Europe, a pandemic is bringing the economy and social life to a standstill worldwide, and thus marking crisis situations that are spreading ever further?
The arts, with their fine sensors and anticipatory thinking, function like seismographs in these times; they sense and anticipate much of what is only communicated to the general public with a delay. Art cannot solve the crises, but it can sharpen our awareness of them.
Does art therefore have a systemically relevant function?
The question of systemic relevance (the term originally comes from the financial sector) arises in the wake of the pandemic that has gripped us since last year in relation to all sectors and professional groups. The whole of society is affected in a far-reaching and global manner. But to what extent does the concept of systemic relevance also apply to art?
System relevance always implies its downside: system irrelevance, i.e. everything that is considered dispensable. But what would society look like if everything that is categorized as non-system relevant in the lockdown disappeared: the shared, lively experience of theater, film, music and art? Art in particular plays an important role in the self-reflection of our society. It is a mirror that reflects constant change, even and especially in this time.
Without artistic creation and lively exchange about works of art, our society is in danger of becoming impoverished, our lives are in danger of losing much of what makes them worth living. Therefore, art is always systemically relevant.
With Daniel Kannenberg (Berlin), Anastasia Khoroshilova (Berlin/Moscow), Niklas Klotz (Linz/Austria), Betty Rieckmann (Karlsruhe), Römer + Römer (Berlin), Robert Schittko (Offenbach am Main), Albrecht Wild (Frankfurt am Main/ DavisKlemmGallery Wiesbaden) and Deniz Alt (Frankfurt am Main), 8 artists show in the exhibition ART IN CRISIS?, which will be on display for a few weeks in the rooms of Galerie Lachenmann, how they deal with the topic of “crisis” in their artistic work.
Although the works of the artists on display demonstrate great diversity in terms of material and technique - from painting, photography, video and light installation to ceramic sculptures - they are united by their focus on people (or their absence) who live as part of society and who, in times of crisis, must constantly reorient themselves and adapt their living conditions. Among other things, the question of a dignified life under extreme circumstances is often discussed artistically.
Using a broad spectrum of artistic positions, the artists in the exhibition not only point to the systemic relevance of art in society, they also articulate the responsibility of people for their actions and the importance of finding a new ethic in the face of crises in society. They show that every crisis also contains the hope for positive change and hold out the prospect of the democratic, healing effect of art after crises. Because art today is not only determined by itself, but also and above all by social developments. Therefore, art actually has the potential to be a force for social change.
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