Mit den Händen zu greifen und doch nicht zu fassen

Vajiko Chachkhiani, Tim Etchells, Petrit Halilaj, Lynn Hershman Leeson, Sofia Hultén, Yutaka Matsuzawa, Agnieszka Polska, Walid Raad, Pamela Rosenkranz, Kateřina Šedá, Juergen Staack

“Disappearance” is a term which has possibly never been more apposite. In an era when disseminated images and information are updated every second, it signifies a conscious exit from the hectic pace of life, in other words: peace and quiet. But just as much as it is something people desire, it is also one of their greatest fears—who isn’t aware of the anxiety of not being seen, of being consigned to oblivion or becoming forgetful oneself?

Unlike physically disappearing, the idea of making yourself invisible at a purely visual level has fired people’s imaginations: even in Greek mythology, Hades, the god of the underworld, donned his Cap of Invisibility to remain hidden from view. In the Song of the Nibelungs, Siegfried wrests a cloak from the dwarf Alberich which renders him invisible. There are many more examples of this phenomenon, but they all share one thing: they illustrate people’s deep desire to be liberated from their own body and concealed from the gaze of others for a while.

Although it’s well known that traces of our internet usage cannot actually be deleted, because the internet “forgets” nothing, nowadays the digital world is a sphere where the user can effectively “go off the radar screen.” Such notions are also reflected in the way the digital revolution affects us. We’re eager to play with fiction, although it has long since ceased to be fiction. As the boundaries of our four-dimensional world are being dissolved and the virtual domain seeps through, this is accompanied by the process of dematerialising and re-materialising.

There are other ways of disappearing, too, namely through disguise and concealment. Whether in a playful context, or while serving the interests of society—for instance spying on enemies of the state, or individuals managing to survive by adopting tactics for not attracting attention in certain circumstances—people adapt externally or internally in order to blend in with their settings.

Ultimately, involuntary disappearances caused by violent interventions or which occur in the course of transformative processes also form a concrete part of our modern-day lives. People, places, cities and their buildings are all subject to acts of destruction as well as natural changes. The Old disappears to make way for the New. Cities and their structures are so overwhelmingly overrun by the processes of transformation that they occasionally completely eliminate a place’s history.

All these preliminary considerations lead us to the question of how the phenomenon of disappearance, with its many connotations, is expressed in contemporary works of art. How do visual artists deal with this material which people find so captivating? What mechanisms bring about and control the processes of dissolution? And what can artists do to counteract disappearance?

Mit den Händen zu greifen und doch nicht zu fassen is an exhibition that brings together strategies for disappearance, dissolution and transformation. It first explores physical and mental disappearance, then goes on to consider our approach to these issues, a process that commences as soon as a particular form or material “aide de memoire” is no longer recognizable.

Curated by Stefanie Böttcher

Related programmes (selection)

September 2, 8pm
Leidenschaft und Ostinato, an evening of baroque music with DJ Michael Glasmeier

September 6, 8pm
Open air film screening with films by Marko Tadić, Ana Hušman and others

November 7, 7pm
Can You See What I Am Saying, an evening of performance with Tim Etchells and Vincent Gambini

December 16, 9:30am–3pm
“Sublimation – Mind, Matter, Concept in Art after Modernism,” international conference of Johannes Gutenberg-Universität, Mainz, departments Philosophy and Art History, at Kunsthalle Mainz


Fade into You: a series of film screenings

Strangers on a Train
Guests: John Skoog and his film class from Akademie für Bildende Künste Mainz
September 13, 7pm
September 20, 7pm
September 27, 7pm
September 29, 7pm