Language/Text/Image: Can you hear me? Can you see me?
An exhibition of the Draiflessen Collection, Mettingen (initially shown there from 20.10.2024 until 16.02.2025) is now on view in KAI 10 | ARTHENA FOUNDATION, D眉sseldorf. Conceived and curated by Dr Barbara Segelken and Birte Hinrichsen. Curatorial adaptation for KAI 10: Ludwig Seyfarth.
Language, text and image are among the most important means of human expression. Far from being neutral in character, they are allied to certain values, norms and cultural procedures, as well as being anchored in social systems. Inevitably, they also serve to draw boundaries which can include or exclude people. Who or what arbitrates whether something may be said or seen?
The questions 鈥淐an you hear me (now)?鈥� or 鈥淐an you see me (now)?鈥� have become very familiar since the rapid expansion of digital interconnectivity. They are frequently voiced by those seeking to ascertain whether they are being clearly heard or seen within a communicative setting. But they also highlight the human need to be heard or seen, and to learn how these mechanisms of in- and exclusion are regulated and circumscribed.
The exhibition Language/Text/Image presents works from the 1950s to the present day, in which the relationship between language, text and image is addressed, reflected and interrogated in regard to its social and political dimensions. Using artistic means, the works explore the possibilities of getting something said, heard or seen.
The selected sound- and text-based works, photographs, prints, films or textiles all take up the challenge of working with something which 鈥� initially, depending on the respective circumstances 鈥� is unstable and hard to control. Conventions in language and image usage are not subverted but used innovatively to foster new semantic spaces. In this, the artists research the practices of reading and seeing, the interweavings of memory and history, and the boundaries between fact and fiction. At the same time, they challenge ingrained patterns of perception and give space to the representation of insecurities and misunderstandings.
In addition, it becomes evident that history and story-telling can be grasped as something that itself has become a historical entity, determined by and resulting from shared experiences 鈥� and that this too can change. This happens against very differing backdrops in terms of origins and character, as well as subjective experience 鈥� and at times when the need for security and control acquires particular urgency.
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An exhibition of the Draiflessen Collection, Mettingen (initially shown there from 20.10.2024 until 16.02.2025) is now on view in KAI 10 | ARTHENA FOUNDATION, D眉sseldorf. Conceived and curated by Dr Barbara Segelken and Birte Hinrichsen. Curatorial adaptation for KAI 10: Ludwig Seyfarth.
Language, text and image are among the most important means of human expression. Far from being neutral in character, they are allied to certain values, norms and cultural procedures, as well as being anchored in social systems. Inevitably, they also serve to draw boundaries which can include or exclude people. Who or what arbitrates whether something may be said or seen?
The questions 鈥淐an you hear me (now)?鈥� or 鈥淐an you see me (now)?鈥� have become very familiar since the rapid expansion of digital interconnectivity. They are frequently voiced by those seeking to ascertain whether they are being clearly heard or seen within a communicative setting. But they also highlight the human need to be heard or seen, and to learn how these mechanisms of in- and exclusion are regulated and circumscribed.
The exhibition Language/Text/Image presents works from the 1950s to the present day, in which the relationship between language, text and image is addressed, reflected and interrogated in regard to its social and political dimensions. Using artistic means, the works explore the possibilities of getting something said, heard or seen.
The selected sound- and text-based works, photographs, prints, films or textiles all take up the challenge of working with something which 鈥� initially, depending on the respective circumstances 鈥� is unstable and hard to control. Conventions in language and image usage are not subverted but used innovatively to foster new semantic spaces. In this, the artists research the practices of reading and seeing, the interweavings of memory and history, and the boundaries between fact and fiction. At the same time, they challenge ingrained patterns of perception and give space to the representation of insecurities and misunderstandings.
In addition, it becomes evident that history and story-telling can be grasped as something that itself has become a historical entity, determined by and resulting from shared experiences 鈥� and that this too can change. This happens against very differing backdrops in terms of origins and character, as well as subjective experience 鈥� and at times when the need for security and control acquires particular urgency.
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