Review

Alfredo
Jaar

The way it is. An Aesthetics of Resistance

In cooperation with the Berlinische Galerie, the Neue Gesellschaft für Bildende Kunst (NGBK) is showing the first retrospective exhibition in Germany of the internationally acclaimed artist Alfredo Jaar (* 1956 / Santiago de Chile).

The artist, who lives in New York, received a grant from the DAAD and spent some time in Berlin 20 years ago (1991). He made a name for himself in Germany with some spectacular individual projects - for instance, an DAAD/NGBK presentation in the Pergamon Museum (1992) or his participation at the documenta (twice, in 1987 and 2002).

The emphasis of the exhibition in the Berlinische Galerie will be on works produced in and for Berlin. These include "A New World", a series of five large-format photographs, which were taken at the Brandenburg Gate shortly after the fall of the Wall and are now being presented for the very first time. The Berlin projects will be supplemented by works on Africa-related themes, which have been a key emphasis of Alfredo Jaar's creative work for many years. His impressive works on genocide in Ruanda, Nelson Mandela's politics, and the tragic fate of South African photo journalist and Pulitzer Prize-winner Kevin Carter are being presented in Berlin for the first time. Lesser known early pieces, highly political interventions into public space that were made in Chile between 1974 and 1981, will also be shown as part of the retrospective, in a parallel presentation in the rooms of the NGBK. Both sections will be supplemented by a pointed intervention in the Alte Nationalgalerie.

An exhibition of the Neue Gesellschaft für Bildende Kunst (NGBK) in cooperation with the Berlinische Galerie, the Nationalgalerie - Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, and the DAAD Artists-in-Berlin-Program. Realised with funding from the Capital Cultural Fund and the Stiftung Deutsche Klassenlotterie Berlin. Supported by the artEDU Stiftung, Zurich.