Participating artists:Chieh-Jen Chen (陳界仁 ), Chieh-Sheng Keng (耿傑生), Juergen Staack, Jung Hsu (徐容) and Natalia Rivera, Lee Wan (이완), Mario Pfeifer, Sven Bergelt, Sojung Jun (전소정) and Yun-Ting Hung (洪韵婷)
Curated by: Ya-Wen Fu (傅雅雯), Yan-Huei Chen (陳妍卉), Minji Kang (강민지)
Period (opening hours):daily 13:00-19:00
Venue:Kunstquartier Bethanien
Mariannenplatz 2
10997 Berlin
kunstquartier-bethanien.de/Opening: Sat. 23 August 2025 at 6 pm with a performance by Constantin Hartenstein, Wu-Kang Chen (陳武康) and Yi-Chi Lee (李奕騏)
The international event series "Shifting Terrains - Beyond Black and White" examines the increasing social polarisation worldwide and its interaction with technologies, bodies and spaces. In an exhibition as well as at a live concert and two film evenings, the artists and a team of curators will present their observations on changes in the social fabric and the relationship between the individual and the community at Kunstquartier Bethanien Berlin. With video and sound works, films and installations, the international team will embark on a search for opportunities for dialogue and social transformation. Digital technologies reinforce existing polarisations. At the same time, however, they also offer new opportunities for exchange and networking and help to create counter-publics and give marginalised perspectives a voice. After technologies, the body as a medium and symbol is the second focus of the series of events, as it is often at the centre of polarised debates due to its political, social and cultural significance. The third focus of the exhibition, spaces, examines how polarisation and digital media create social and physical spaces of exclusion in which people can no longer move freely.
The group exhibition "Shifting Terrains" features video works and installations by international artists, such as the video installation "Again - Noch einmal" by Mario Pfeiffer, in which he explores racism, lynch law and civil courage with the help of interviews and staged re-enactments. Or the video "Worn Away" by Taiwanese artist Chieh-Jen Chen, which shows people in a state of imprisonment who, in the course of the transformation of the world of work through digitalisation, are to be used by the state.
become useless bodies for the state in the wake of digitalisation.
During the exhibition opening, Constantin Hartenstein, Wu-Kang Chen and Yi-Chi Lee will be showing their performance "Hold", in which they explore the body as terrain, stable and unstable, supporting and being supported.
Under the title "Sonic Terrains", sound installations, generative audio-visuals and real-time calculations are combined in one evening to create live concerts in which a multi-layered terrain of perception and narrative is created through rituals of cultural translation. The selected films, which will be shown on the two film evenings under the title "Pas de deux, trois, quatre...", superficially tell of dual polarisation. On closer inspection, however, they reveal their actual narrative in the nuances in between and thus form the thematic framework for the series of events.
Further informationen & programme
