Uta Neumann

"When The Mountains Sway, I Hum"

"And because androgyny is a characteristic of a primordial wholeness in which all possibilities are summarized, the primordial human being [...] is also understood as androgynous in many traditions." *

Uta Neumann feels that nature is the most value-free place where people can be human. "Nature accepts me as I am, and I do everything I can to encounter the landscape as it is." Following on from this experience, in the exhibition "When the mountains sway, I hum" the artist explores the relationship between herself, stones and landscapes using the media of photography, video and risography.

*"Mephistopheles and the Androgyne", Mircea Eliade

Artist in Residence

In February 2024, I was able to spend a week working on new projects at KuBa:Kulturbahnhof in Prignitz and could concentrate on my upcoming solo exhibition in Bielefeld at Artist Unlimited. In the B/W lab I was able to continue working on my self-portrait work "Born by Pebbles & Stones", and experimenting with a new risograph installation work and, wonderfully, start a new video work. An intensive and eventful time. Thank you, KuBa!

Artist in Residence with Barbara Collé @ Frans Masereel Centrum, Belgium

We have been invited for a residency period at The Frans Masereel Centrum in Belgium.

The Frans Masereel Centrum is a center for contemporary art, combining an artist-oriented exhibition and production schedule with an international residency program for artists and critics, often with a specific focus on printed matter-at-large.

Barbara and I sent in a proposal following their open call for their collective residency and, to our delight, we were invited for this December.

We will continue to work there on the long-term project we are working on. A project that has to do with the beginning and the end, with continuity, with artists’ books and mythology, with movement and flow. We will tell more about it soon.

Artist in Research mit Barbara Collé @ Embassy of the Free Mind, Amsterdam - The Bibliotheca Philosophica Hermetica

For the long-running project for which we already went to the Kulturbahnhof residency in Brandenburg, and for which we have been invited for an artist residency at The Frans Masereel Centrum later this year, Barbara and I now dive into the archives.

Between 18 and 25 May, we may browse through very old books at the Embassy of the Free Mind. To find more substantive, theoretical and visual knowledge for our artistic project.

The Library of Hermetic Philosophy is the library collection of the Embassy of the Free Mind. The collection comprises more than 28,000 books, including about 2,300 ancient books and three hundred manuscripts from the 15th, 16th, 17th and 18th centuries; rare, often beautifully illustrated works.

The Ritman Research Institute is dedicated to studying the history of hermetic streams of thought. Named for the founder of the library, Joost R. Ritman, the Ritman Research Institute is dedicated to studying the history of hermetic streams of thought, especially those in which the Bibliotheca Philosophica Hermetica has strong holdings: hermetica, mysticism, Christian theosophy, heterodoxy, alchemy, Rosicrucians, Freemasonry, Jewish and Christian Kabbala, comparative religion and Western Esotericism.

Barbara and I previously had a small glimpse of this special collection. We cannot wait for all the stories and images we will see and discover there.

Artist in Residence with Barbara Collé

Casa Sasso – Artist in Residence from 11th of June until the 7th of July. Check: Sasso Residency

Elements, holding Space

LA PERFEZIONE DI UN SPIRITO SOTTILE

Concert to Salvatore Sciarrino's score in the context of the music festival Schlossmediale Schloss Werdenberg, Switzerland

“The gods have died, and we no longer believe in magic. Yet we still recognize a certain mysterious solitude. Led by the wind, we can find something that links all these places, however diverse. A secret sign, one ideal for the theater: space manifesting itself in a pure state. And the visitor discovers a condition that is primary, contradictory, frightening. The loss of human dimensions.”

Salvatore Sciarrino, introduction to La Perfezione Di Uno Spirito Sottile, Ricordi, 1984 (translated by Paul Griffiths)

A lament for a “non-optimistic nature…and our human vocation to self-destruction”, Salvatore Sciarrino calls his ~45 minute work La perfezione di uno spirito sottile (Perfection of a subtle spirit) a musical ritual, suggesting it be performed outside, “…in the vicinity of precipices, cliffs, strange rock formations, or boundless upland plains.” As a starting point, artist Uta Neumann selected Lausitz – one of Germany’s largest open pit brown coal mining regions, lying 150 km from Berlin – as a speculative site for this ritual to unfold. Here, one can witness on a vast scale, man’s role as a geomorphological agent in the natural landscape, and in turn, nature’s weathering and reclaiming of these colossal artificial forms. A choreography of large-format video projection, photographic light boxes and quadraphonic field recordings echo this mountainous moonscape and suggest potential ritualistic objects. Nested in this space, the flute’s barely audible wind, whistling and moaning sounds – grow to melodic fragments and animalistic growls and screams. Over time, the soprano’s dual persona emerges, questioning the origin of things and telling of burning with thirst and dying.

With Olivia Stahn (soprano), Rebecca Lane(flute), Vanessa Porter (bells), Adam Asnan (sound design) and Uta Neumann (video & photography)

Concert-Concept: Rebecca Lane & Uta Neumann
Installation: Uta Neumann

Power Cage

Töne&Schatten//Sounds&Shadows

STRAHLER
Pflügerstrasse 15
12047 Berlin
U 8 Schönleinstrasse, M 29 Pannierstrasse

LA PERFEZIONE DI UN SPIRITO SOTTILE

#1 convolution

Steine&Hölzer

Ausstellungseröffnung: 26. Mai von 12 bis 20 Uhr
Galerie „Löwen.haus“, Gerswalde (Uckermark), Dorfmitte 11

"In den seriellen Studien der beiden KünstlerInnen paaren sich elementarste Formen der Natur mit einem überraschenden Variantenreichtum der durch die verwendeten Gestaltungstechniken des Druckes bzw. der Fotografie gleichzeitig verstärkt und abstrahiert, und dadurch stilisiert wird."

Zu sprechen anheben

Diese Teile ergeben als Ganzes eine Partitur für ein Stück, das von Fülle und Verlust und vom Ausloten der Identitäten erzählt.

Beim Erschauen und Hören entblättert sich der Zusammenhang als Spur einer Transformation.

Sa & So jeweils 15 bis 20 Uhr