JENSEITS - BEYOND THE BODY

curated by Anne Berk

We are part of the stream of life. We change constantly. How do we deal with our transient body? How do we envisage death, that ultimate frontier?

The Dutch curator Anne Berk invited thirteen artists for the exhibition jenseits – Beyond the Body to reflect on these questions in art objects, installations and videos. They hold up their art as a mirror to us, without being able to give an answer.

On 27 October WELTKUNSTZIMMER, a new exhibition venue in Düsseldorf, will open its doors. The first guest curator is the Dutch art critic Anne Berk. The Hans Peter Zimmer Stiftung is located in a former bread factory in Düsseldorf. The new WELTKUNSTZIMMER is an extension of the multi-disciplinary art program that is being offered.

 

Artists:

Erzsébet Baerveldt, Martin uit den Bogaard, Célio Braga, Esther Bruggink, Jeroen Eisinga, Judith Maria Kleintjes, Mark Kramer, Ida van der Lee, Alet Pilon, Jaap de Ruig, Brele Scholz, Jan Thomas, Roy Villevoye.

 

Frame Programme:

October, 19.00 Opening WELTKUNSTZIMMER JENSEITS - Beyond the Body 

Sat 3 November, 13.00 – 18.45  Talks of curator Anne Berk, Det Smeets of Memento, film Le Quattre Volte, in cooperation with sculpture network. Entry 10 euro. Shared dinner on request/own expenses.

Sat 10, Sun 11 November Program for Dutch public about jenseits- Beyond the Body see www.anneberk.nl

Wed 14 November, 20.00 CONCERT with Hauschka. Entry 8 euro.  

Fri 30 November , 19.00, FINISSAGE with Butoh Performance von Yuko Kaseki. Free entry.

 

Opening Exhibition WELTKUNSTZIMMER JENSEITS -Beyond the Body

27 October - 30 November 2012, Opening Reception 27 October, 8 p.m.

Opening Hours: Thursdays to Sundays 2.00 - 6.00 p.m.

 

 

 

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"O sad humanity! Why do you fear alarms of icy death? Everything must change: but nothing perishes. The soul will never die’, wrote the Latin poet Ovid two thousand years ago in his ‘Metamorphosis’.

 

Man is the only animal that can foresee his own death. We are mortals and we know it.

How to tame our fears? How to reconcile ourselves with the disappearance of our individual personality, which is treated as the key value in the West? How to console the survivors? What does it mean death? Is there something beyond the body? Is there a soul?

These questions have engaged man since time immemorial. People pondered about it in philosophy, religion and art, without being able to find a definitive answer (those who think they found answers, are called ‘believers’). One day we will pass this door of no return and no one can tell us what happened.

In our secularized era we indulge in the display of perfect beauty and eternal youth in advertisements and the media. Death is a black hole that we try to ignore. But we will die anyway, no matter what medical technology or cosmic surgery.

In this vacuum, this ‘religious deficit’ these questions about death trigger the imagination of contemporary artists, without being able to give answers. We don’t know. We can only use our imagination. And from that originates art.

 

While walking through the exhibition the visitor will experience a symbolic last passage through different stages: 

 

BEFORE DEATH      Approaching death-Memento Mori-Suffering-Saving your Soul

DEATH                    Facing death-Surrendering to death-Fearing death-Decay

BEYOND THE BODY In Between states-Release-Transformation-Not Being 

SURVIVORS            Healing-Mourning/Reviving?-Commemorating Death