Re-start and program 2022

The birthplace of Dada has now opened in its renovated location. With temporary exhibitions in the Vaulted Cellar or Tuesday Soirées in the Historical Hall, the Cabaret Voltaire in Zurich functions as a platform for contemporary art and debates—in dialogue with the avant-garde. Since the completion of the renovations, there is a new Artists’ Bar in the entrance area, where one-year-long exhibitions are shown. The Vaulted Cellar now also houses the Dada Showcase with exhibits from the Kunsthaus Zürich’s Dada collection. 

Vaulted Cellar:
ektor garcia: nudos de tiempo
May 20, 2022–September 25, 2022
The artisanal object landscapes by ektor garcia (b. 1985) are frozen moments within an ongoing process. Using a variety of materials and techniques, the artist creates temporary structures that can be reworked at any time. Set in juxtaposition, the crocheted textiles, copper wire connections, ceramic forms, and metal castings function like free-form poems that constantly generate fresh resonances. For each exhibition, garcia produces new constellations that resist the urge to establish categories and hierarchies. They are punk and queer. The sensual installations break with narrative forms that are intended to convey a certain story without obliviousness to history. Through the materials and symbols, multi-layered content traces can be picked up on without imposing themselves.
Curators: Fabian Flückiger and Salome Hohl

Artists’ Bar: 
Ilaria Vinci: Phoenix Philosophy Café
April 30, 2022–July 9, 2023
For Phoenix Philosophy Café, Ilaria Vinci (b. 1991) took as her starting point a particular type of fireplace that has its origins in the south of Italy at the beginning of the 1900s: a kind of living alcove where people gather, share stories, debate, eat, drink, and play together—and in so doing, discover things about themselves and others. The colorful flickering of the flaming lamps and the partially burnt furniture, which the artist created through skillful paint effects, underline the reference to the fireplace. The mythological figure of Phoenix can be seen throughout the exhibition, as, for example, on the two flanking columns of the fireplace console. The phrase “like Phoenix from the ashes” also alludes to the collapse of an old system and the emergence of old values in a new guise—a remarkable reference regarding the Dada house and the contexts of then and now.

Dada Library:
Stefan Burger: Narcissus, zentrales Höhlengrau, Erbse, Flamingo (I&II)
The collections of the deceased Dada collector Hans Bollinger and the Dada specialist and curator Guido Magnaguagno constitute the foundation of the library. The library contains significant Dada publications and will be constantly expanded. Stefan Burger (b. 1977) exhibits two luminaire objects in the library that light up the room as well as, hopefully, the moods of the viewers. The concepts that can be associated with the sculptures fluctuate between various contrasting states: beautiful, ugly, imaginative, pedantic, decorative, useful, erotically appealing or unpleasant. They are hybrid installations or tilting figures which, depending on the view, lean towards different qualities and interpretations and deal with the notions of decoration and function.

Preview:
Sophie Taeuber-Arp/Mai-Thu Perret
October 14, 2022–April 30, 2023

Cabaret Voltaire is supported by the City of Zurich.