Özlem Altın: Prisma

Özlem Altın (*1977 in Goch) has been awarded the Hannah Höch Förderpreis 2024. The honour includes the solo exhibition Prisma at the Berlinische Galerie (until October 14) and an eponymous catalogue.

Join the artist talk (in German) with Özlem Altın discussing her work and current exhibition Prisma with Maren Lübbke-Tidow, Artistic Director of the European Month of Photography 2024 and Katia Reich, curator of the exhibition, on the occasion of the presentation of the exhibition catalogue.

The elaborately designed publication in combination with an artist’s book was published by Distanz Verlag. On 200 pages the book unites two volumes and is an experimental continuation of the exhibition. It is bilingual (German/English) and contains essays by Maren Lü̈bbke-Tidow and Federica Bueti, as well as forewords by Thomas Kö̈hler and Katia Reich. The catalogue is available for 29.80 EUR at the museum shop. The artist will be signing copies on site.

In her artistic work, Özlem Altın prefers not to be associated with any particular art medium. At the Berlinische Galerie, she has engaged in a dynamic process of collaging and photomontage to create a multifaceted, site-specific installation, in which she examines—with a strong measure of empathy—the relational fabric between photography, archive, and body. 

The exhibition invites visitors to engage with the cycles of life—as a metaphor for process and change or as a reflection of the constantly evolving clockwork of the cosmos. For Özlem Altın, the body is a means of expression and a repository of knowledge at the very same time, or, as she puts it, an “interface for communicating, connecting, and transmitting knowledge through touch and contact.” For her multilayered installations, comprised of works ranging from large-format paintings to room-sized sculptural constellations, Özlem Altın draws on her own and found photographs from the archive she has been accruing for over two decades, with a focus on body language, gestures, and touch. Here, photography becomes an artistic material, as well as the point of departure and reference for her creative practice, for instance when she arranges pictures of hands or eyes together with other image fragments, thus creating, also through overpainting and cropping, an imaginary world of new sensory connections, calling to mind a speculative way of mapping. Here, the artist’s compositions of inner and outer pictures elude any form of clear interpretation, making ambivalence visually tangible. 

Since 2011, the Hannah Höch Förderpreis has been bestowed on artists by the State of Berlin. The award recognizes the lifework to date of an artist who lives and works in Berlin.

The exhibition has been funded by Senate Department for Culture and Social Cohesion.

Also on view: Akinbode Akinbiyi. Being, Seeing, Wandering (until October 14) / Closer to Nature. Building with Fungi, Trees, Mud (until October 14) / Mariechen Danz. edge out (until March 31, 2025)