20 Feb 2013

readiness to act & footnotes to breakup at Motorenhalle, Dresden

‚Handlungsbereitschaft – Skizze einer Generation am Ende der Geschichte / Readiness to act – Sketch of a generation at the end of history’ works and designs a psychological profile of today's 20 to 30-year-olds and their time in positions of 24 young artists. For the curators, this is mainly the analysis of their own generation, who feel that popular slogans like "internship generation”, "Facebook generation", "Generation Fear" do not sufficiently mirror and question that generation.
So far, no exhibition has dealt so specifically with the thoughts, feelings and experiences of this generation. Key issues of the exhibition are mainly the consequences of the digital breakthrough for the individual and the community, the search for identity in the midst of an increasingly boundless economic world, as well as the changing political consciousness of our primarily self-realization and optimization oriented society.
Finally, give the works the impression that between uniformity and coercion for individualization , aimless propulsion and endless self-examinations often appear moments of longing and growing wills to change.

‘Readiness to act’ is conceived as a space and platform for dialogue: On several evenings in March writers, scientists and artists will discuss the values, claims and self-understanding of this generation. Among others there have been invited the political scientist and Hannah Arendt expert Wolfgang Heuer and Jens-Christian Rabe, editor of the feature section of the Süddeutsche Zeitung, as well as the theatre director Julian Francis Bisesi.

The concept

The exhibition series ‘readiness to act – Sketch of a generation at the end of history’ had already been shown twice in Berlin. Already at this time a tension began to emerge: between private being and public action, between sporadic involvement and a sense of stagnation among young people in a media-oriented period in which almost everything is allowed, but almost nothing really is wanted. The exhibition follows a dynamic concept: With each new edition there will be added more new artists and the curatorial focus will be changed to make the sketch even denser. On the occasion of the exhibition a catalogue with contributions by Stefan Willer, Meredith Haaf, Lukas Töpfer, Guido Karl Tamponi, Tina Gebler, Andrea Hanna Hünniger, Mathias Böswetter, Daniel Tyradellis & Ellen Blumenstein will be published.

Participating artists

Murat Adash, Julius von Bismarck, Martin Bothe, Gabo Camnitzer, Luis Camnitzer, Linus Dutz, FORT, Friedemann Heckel, Fabian Knecht, Martin Kohout, Max Kowalewski, Anne Duk Hee Jordan, Markues, Laura McLardy, Christoph Medicus, Konrad Mühe, Henrike Naumann, Alessandro Rauschmann, Mike Ruiz, Anna Szaflarski, Max Schaffer, Marcel Tarelkin, Johannes Vogl, Mikka Wellner