Grund und Bo­den — On co­exis­tence in the NRW art coll­ec­tion

The ex­hi­bi­ti­on “Grund und Bo­den. How we live tog­e­ther” at the North Rhi­ne-West­pha­lia Art Coll­ec­tion K21 fo­cu­ses on hu­man co­ha­bi­ta­ti­on. The­mes such as war, ex­pul­si­on, flight and the de­s­truc­tion of na­tu­re co­me tog­e­ther he­re, along wi­th the ho­pe of re­con­s­truc­tion and re­ge­ne­ra­ti­on. Mo­re than 30 in­ter­na­tio­nal ar­tists* and coll­ec­ti­ves re­flect on dif­fe­rent per­spec­ti­ves on ha­bi­tat, plants, ow­ner­ship and com­mu­nal sha­ring. The fo­cus ex­tends far bey­ond Düs­sel­dorf — earth, co­al, lo­tus silk and cho­co­la­te are used as con­nec­ting ma­te­ri­als to make glo­bal ex­pe­ri­en­ces per­cep­ti­ble, from Bra­zil to Viet­nam, via the Con­go and back to Ger­ma­ny.

Ta­king as its start­ing point the his­to­ri­cal si­gni­fi­can­ce of the ex­hi­bi­ti­on ve­nue, the Stän­de­haus, and its par­lia­men­ta­ry past, the ex­hi­bi­ti­on al­so looks at is­sues of re­sour­ce use and ma­nage­ment: from in­di­ge­nous forms of eco­no­my and coll­ec­ti­ve ow­ner­ship to vi­si­ons of an equi­ta­ble fu­ture such as uto­pian block­chain pro­jects. Vi­si­tors* are in­vi­ted to be in­spi­red by the in­ter­ac­tion bet­ween sen­so­ry im­pres­si­ons and con­cepts. Per­for­man­ces and ac­tion days ac­com­pa­ny the ex­hi­bi­ti­on, tur­ning places li­ke the open-cast li­g­ni­te mi­ne in Garz­wei­ler in­to the stage for cur­rent strug­gles bet­ween na­tu­re con­ser­va­ti­on, ac­ti­vism and in­dus­tri­al lo­gic.