Sven Drühl’s artistic work lies in the field of conceptual painting, belonging to the tradition of serial and Appropriation Art. In a kind of remix or transformation, he re-interprets famous paintings from art history or contemporary art. As patterns for his unconventional paintings, he chooses ‘classics’ ranging from Monet and C.D. Friedrich to Hodler, even Havekost. Drühl’s pictures focus on experimental painterly reproduction and simultaneously play with the idea of imitation in an ironic way. The famous patterns are reproduced using contemporary techniques and thus quasi recreated. Sven Drühl uses silicon to draw the outlines; oil paints and glossy varnishes give the paintings their typical cool ambience.
In recent works, Drühl abandons the characteristic silicon paste. He combines paintings based on photographic patterns with hackneyed citations from art history, thus extending his consistently followed concept of serial appropriation by the inclusion of real photographs. In his neon works, Drühl goes one step further: the outlines of the borrowed pictorial motifs are realised in neon. These works concentrate on the silhouettes and exude a mysterious glow, meaning that reminiscences of Romanticism and its landscape idyll are again expressed in contemporary image reception.

To acknowledge the award of the “Falkenrot” Prize 2007 to Sven Drühl, Künstlerhaus Bethanien is showing a representative selection of the artist’s work to date.

Falkenrot Prize 2007 – Sven Drühl, 7th – 23rd December 2007, Studio 1
Opening: Thursday, 6th December 2007, 7 pm

Marianne Vierø works with photography and installation, which she employs partly as an inseparable entity, partly as strictly separate media. The objects that she photographs are usually unspectacular and everyday. It is only in the context in which they are presented – or from which they are taken – that a shift takes place in the viewer’s perspective, so visualising specific structures inherent to these things, making them ‘remarkable’, and assigning them a new status.
For “Arrangements of Beautiful Resemblance”, Vierø built a wall in the studio using red bricks; subsequently she photographed it, then tore it down and built it up again – in such a way that the mortar joints between the bricks created a different structure. The wall was photographed from various perspectives, torn down, rebuilt, and so on. Vierø has now arranged the twelve photographs resulting from the repetition of this process so that the large-format prints themselves create a kind of structure, and - as a result of the perspective shifts documented in the photographs – take on an almost sculptural character within the installation.
Marianne Vierø works skilfully to interlock two artistic media and different dimensions, so revealing exciting new perceptual approaches to the viewer.

Marianne Vierø holds a fellowship from the BERLINAUT-Programme of the Danish Royal Embassy within the context of our International Studio Programme.

Marianne Vierø – Arrangements of Beautiful Resemblance, 7th – 23rd December 2007, Studio 2
Opening: 6th December 2007, 7 pm

Serhat Köksal has continued to develop his multimedia project 2/5 BZ, initiated in Istanbul in 1986, up until the present day, expressing himself in a wide range of media forms. Besides audiovisual performances like “NO Touristik NO Exotic”, which have been shown internationally, Serhat Köksal has produced an uncountable number of tapes, CDs, video-collages, performances, stickers and Copy-Zines.
In his project “NO Pipeline NO Exotic”, Serhat Köksal aka 2/5 BZ illuminates the common cultural clichés between Orient and Occident in a critical and humorous way, investigating their effects on people’s economic or political situation and individual states of mind. He employs collage and cut-up techniques, found film material, outdoor shots and samples. The project concentrates on concepts such as “cultural pipeline” and “energy dialogue”, presenting them with Soundart and “Planetcore” visuals.
At the opening of the exhibition, which includes a video installation and collage-wallpapers, Serhat Köksal will present his new CD/DVD “NO Exotic” within the context of an improvised live performance in collaboration with sound artist Nicolas Wiese.
Further information and links: http://www.2-5bz.com http://www.2-5bz.com

Serhat Köksal holds a fellowship from Künstlerhaus Bethanien GmbH within the context of our International Studio Programme.

Serhat Köksal aka 2/5 BZ – NO Pipeline NO Exotic, 7th – 23rd December 2007, Studio 3
Opening, CD/DVD release and improvised audiovisual live performance in collaboration with Nicolas Wiese: Thursday, 6th December 2007, from 7 pm