A pavilion of diverse positions

This autumn, the Dortmunder Kunstverein celebrates its 40th birthday. This makes it one of the younger of the 300 or so art associations organised in the Arbeitsgemeinschaft Deutscher Kunstvereine (ADKV). It was founded by Dortmund citizens who were ‘hungry for contemporary art’. This is how Rebekka Seubert, who has been the artistic director of the association since March 2020, describes it. ‘The founders back in the 1980s wanted to be able to have their say and present the latest positions on the art scene in their city, such as Hanne Darboven or Joseph Beuys.’

The association already received a kind of premature birthday present last year when it was awarded the ADKV-ART COLOGNE Prize for Art Associations - for its particularly innovative programme and creative mediation work. This award now enables the Dortmunder Kunstverein to have its own stand at this year's ART COLOGNE and thus represent this important facet of cultural life in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. After all, the civic engagement in the many art associations in this country is something quite unique globally and has been listed as intangible UNESCO cultural heritage since 2021.

Part of the innovative programme of the Dortmunder Kunstverein is to ‘help groups that are insufficiently represented in society to gain more visibility in the discourse’, as Rebekka Seubert explains: ‘The diversity of positions today no longer allows for clear attributions. We want to reflect that.’ In the recently concluded exhibition ‘Jalousies’ by French video artist Brice Dellsperger, curated by Seubert, short films were shown in which Dellsperger recreates iconic film scenes with altered gender identities under low-budget conditions. Queer cinema meets camp aesthetics and ironically questions the conventions of both cinema and society. These film sequences are complemented by two new video works by Dellsperger. ‘We see ourselves as more than just an exhibition venue,’ says Rebekka Seubert. ‘It's important to us to work closely with the artists and also to provide them with funding for a new production specifically for the exhibition. We want them to take a further step in their work with us if possible.’

For one of his two new works, Dellsperger also filmed in the rooms of the Dortmunder Kunstverein. He was probably just as overwhelmed by them as most visitors who come here for the first time. In March 2023, the association moved into the former showroom of a health insurance company, which is characterised by extremely high walls, a sculptural staircase and large glass fronts facing the street. This huge, gutted space has an almost museum-like feel and is also located in the immediate vicinity of Dortmund's U - Centre for Art and Creativity, one of the city's cultural hotspots. ‘There's such a pavilion feeling here,’ enthuses Rebekka Seubert. ‘What's more, I've always found the concept of ‘one room, one exhibition’ very appealing.’

The new premises were opened with ‘Silent Voices in a Palm Grove’, the first institutional solo exhibition by French-Egyptian artist Hoda Tawakol in Germany. Her large-format textile sculptures, which thematise the power of the gaze - for example as an instrument for deciding on access and exclusion - transformed the space into a surreal palm grove protected from outside views. A ‘place outside the world’, as art is capable of creating at best.

In addition to the immediate sensory impression of the exhibition, Rebekka Seubert also attaches great importance to the mediation work that the Kunstverein carries out, primarily through publications or academic lectures, but also through film screenings or parties. For example, the Hoda Tawakol exhibition was accompanied by a themed evening on ‘Hair Politics’, in which the view of women's hair was examined from a historical and cultural perspective. And since summer 2022, the Liquid Currency Bar created by artist Zoe Williams has been a temporary venue not only for bar operations, but also for performances and concerts.

The exhibition by James Gregory Atkinson almost three years ago was one of the most successful exhibitions to date under the artistic direction of Seubert. In ‘6 Friedberg-Chicago’, the German-American artist traced an arc from his own personal history as the son of a black US soldier stationed in Friedberg, Hesse, to around 150 years of Afro-German history, which was also made tangible in its racist structures with meticulous historical research and a filmic approach. Once again, the Kunstverein presented itself as a place of exchange and social understanding that looks far beyond the confines of Dortmund and Germany.