THE E N D (It's About New Beginnings)

The end as a final symbolic heartbeat: a moment of pause that is also meant to be a beginning: ‘THE E N D’ brings together alumni and current students of Prof. Mischa Kuball's (Public Art) ‘urban stage’ seminar for a performance weekend and to mark the end of Kuball's 19-year teaching career at the KHM.

27 March, Friday: 2:00 p.m.–9:30 p.m.
(3:00 p.m. opening remarks, from 8:00 p.m. cinema evening)

28 March, Saturday: 2:00 p.m.–9:30 p.m.
(from 7:15 p.m. drinks, from 7:45 p.m. cinema evening)

The exhibition focuses on time-based works. It shows performances and videos on the one hand, but also painting, photography, sculpture, VR and sound works in which performative elements or gestures are inscribed.

The 30 works on display are thematically dedicated to the crises of recent decades. They extend from the Riphahnsaal, through the cinema and the Apostelnklosterplatz, to the interstitial spaces of the Kölnischer Kunstverein. They symbolise the fragility of the present with artistic strategies such as repetition and gesture: in crying, in window cleaning, in spectacular stage moments, in cinematic and performative spatial analyses. Or they develop dystopian analyses, borderline states, giving voice to the unspeakable.

The programme features performances by Ale Bachlechner, Friedrich Boell, Cloudi, Vera Drebusch & Florian Egermann, Mathilde Hawkins & Max Mauro Schmid, Jan Hoeft, Cătălina Bucos & Karin Fritz, Dabin Kim, Stefanie Klingemann, Ella Kühn, Alysha Lahner, Constantin Leonhard, Jojo Schütt, Mila Stoytcheva, Evamaria Schaller, The Blind Queen of Anger, as well as interventions on the building by The Time Teller (the latter two as personas of Mohamad Moe Sabbah).

The Riphahnsaal, on the other hand, features sculptures, paintings and video works by Finn Wagner, Alwin Lay, Charlotte Triebus, Jonas Monka, Johannes Bendzulla, Alexandra Lex Nikitina, Christoph Kilian, Pauline M'barek and Jens Pecho.

The video works by Jens Pecho, Noa Gur, Finn Wagner, Cătălina Bucos & Ada Kopaz will be presented throughout, as will the films by Alexander Basile, Viktor Brim and Lina Sieckmann & Miriam Gossing on two cinema evenings in collaboration with Filmclub 318.

The meeting of KHM alumni with current students deliberately forms a cross-generational conclusion to Prof. Mischa Kuball's teaching career at the KHM since 2007. The gathering is taking place at the invitation of Mischa Kuball in close cooperation with Valérie Knoll, director of the Kölnischer Kunstverein. The performance weekend is curated by graduates Maja Funke and Helin Korkmaz.

We would like to thank the Kölnischer Kunstverein, Kunsthaus Lempertz , the RheinEnergieStiftung Kultur and Gaffel Kölsch for their support.