February 8 – März 26, 2017
On Invitation by the GRASSI Ethnological Museum Leipzig, participants of the master program “Cultures of the Curatorial” at the Academy of Fine Arts Leipzig delve into the development of ethnographic exhibition display within the temporarily empty spaces of the renovated Africa galleries.
Taking as point of departure the museum’s photographic archive and including works by the Leipzig photographer and long-time museum staff member, Karin Wieckhorst, the exhibition “On Showing and Looking” investigates various modes of display and reception.
How do the presentation modes develop when meandering between public education, cultural mediation and perceived “window to the world”?
Karin Wieckhorst (born in 1942 in Holzhausen/Sachsen), museum photographer from 1965 to 2007, documented the museum’s activities in various formats including exhibition documentation, object and travel photography. From 1969 until 1973, she completed a photography degree at the Academy of Visual Arts Leipzig, where she developed personal projects, which gained her artistic recognition outside of the museum’s context. In her works she investigates societal groups, with series such as “Portraits of Women” (1991-92) or “STRANGERS. Asylum in Saxony” (1992-93), and seeks to capture “distant” countries, which she has been able to visit since the 1990’s (i.e. Tunisia, 1993 or Iran, 2000).
The exhibition “On Showing and Looking” juxtaposes her works against categorisation and educational formats, including various display systems, floor plans and exhibition catalogs, as well as with the question of viewing habits in ethnological museums.
"On Showing and Looking" - Exhibition in the GRASSI Museum für Völkerkunde zu Leipzig
Juana Awad, Julia Eckert, Anna Emmerling, Sebastian Gebeler, Jens Geiger, Merle Heinrich, Krisztina Hunya, Imke Kannegießer, Daniel Niggemann, Anais Roesch, Sabine Schmid, Nada Schroer, Inga Seidler, Marion Siampakou, Jennifer Smailes, Viktoria Tiedeke
With photographs by: Karin Wieckhorst
Graphic design and exhibition design by: Katharina Köhler
KdK-TEAM:
Benjamin Meyer-Krahmer, Julia Kurz, Barbara Steiner
A cooperation with:
GRASSI Museums für Völkerkunde zu Leipzig

On Showing and Looking at the Ethnological Museum - A performative and discursive approach
26.03.2017
Workshop as the framework programm of the exibition "On Showing and Looking"
13:30 – 14.30 Uhr
Dialogical guidance by photographer Karin Wieckhorst and Nada Schroer
15 – 16 Uhr
Performance in the exhibition by Nathalie Mba Bikoro (Conceptual Artist, Associate Lecturer in Philosophy and Arts History, Curator of Performance Programmes at Savvy Contemporary)
16 – 18 Uhr
Talk und public disscusion in the exhibition with Nanette Snoep (Director of Staatliche Ethnographische Sammlungen Sachsens), Peggy Piesche (Academy Bayreuth) and Nadja Ofuatey-Alazard (Academy Bayreuth), moderated by Margareta von Oswald (HU Berlin)