BLACK WAS ALWAYS THE COLOUR OF THE OTHERS

Davide Cantoni, Swimwear girl bloomingdales, 2002 Burned paper Black was always the colour of the others Exhibition + book release with artists' edition Davide Cantoni, Motoko Dobashi, Moritz Dometshauser, Katja Eckert, Oliver Lanz, Axel Lieber, Matthias Männer, Peggy Meinfelder, Christopher Muller, Katherine Newbegin, Danica Phelps, Sebastian Pöllmann, Sibylle Rath, Carsten Recksik, Wolfgang Stehle Opening: 28.10.2011, from 6pm October 29 - December 10, 2011 Tuesday - Saturday 12:00 pm - 6:00 pm In cooperation with Galerie Alexandra Saheb (Berlin), Dina4 Projekte (Munich/Berlin) presents the exhibition "Black was always the colour of the others". The exhibition presents works by the 15 artists of Dina4 Projekte along with a newly published catalogue and a limited portfolio edition (10 + 3 AP) each containing 15 sheets. The exhibition reflects the broad spectrum and the diversity of media in the programme, and provides an overview of the past eight years. Davide Cantoni The basis for Cantoni's Burn Drawings is mostly current, politically charged press photos from the New York Times. Cantoni uses these photos as a template, altering the size of the motif, transferring it to tissue paper and burning the image into the fine paper using sunlight and a magnifying glass. Through this process of conservation, the ephemeral flood of media images that we are confronted with on a daily basis disappears, and the drawings, despite their fragility, remain more permanently fixed in our memories. Motoko Dobashi Dobashi's drawings document a combination of pictorial elements from different epochs: for example, traditional Japanese prints, old-master painting as well as graphic elements taken from street art, Mangas or computer games. The reduced colour of the fragile worlds, which imply a fictitious and abstracted system of forms and spaces, draw the viewer in, involving him/her in a game of imagination and suggestion. Moritz Dometshauser The central themes in Dometshauser's painting are current social trends, fears and constraints as well as a critical attitude to contemporary events. His compositions are made up of narrative and interconnected visual fragments that communicate and interact with one another to form autonomous realities and dream structures.   Katja Eckert The digital works of Katja Eckert, which are drawn at the computer and exposed on photo paper, convey a fictitious reality and evoke a particular uncanny atmosphere. The photographic method of reproduction and the photorealistic effect create an almost perfect mimesis of complex pictorial worlds, raising certain doubts in the viewer with regard to reality. Oliver Lanz The painting of Oliver Lanz combines two contrary types of representation: a classical painting method and the possibilities of developing images using digital means. This gives his work the character of an "installation painting", dissolving the limits and the definition of the space, and bringing about, through the combination of figurative and abstract elements, an entirely new reality. Axel Lieber The source and leitmotif of Axel Lieber's works are simple commodities and everyday articles of use. These are removed from their original context, transformed, reduced to their skeleton and placed within a new set of relations - without, however, losing their original identity. With an underlying irony and humour, the newly created sculptures quote aspects of the everyday world and the art world. Matthias Männer Männer's sculptures and drawings have an ambiguity that is manifested in abstract as well as representational elements, and brings together both technoid and organic forms. Archaic oppositions between technology and man, between perfection and emotion, are a consistent theme in Männer's works, which also reflect society's material desires. Peggy Meinfelder Meinfelder's graphic work is characterised by the scientific technique of dot drawing, used in palaeontology and archaeology. Also her "fossil" works attest to the archaeological character of documentation. In these media in particular Meinfelder sees the possibility of dealing critically with political and social themes and the historiography of the media, especially in the FRG and the GDR. Christopher Muller The photographer arranges everyday objects into pictorial forms and compositions in the tradition of the still life, a genre borrowed from painting. The setups in these pictures are emphatically artificial and, due to the preservation of the original scale of the objects, have a presence that is meant to strengthen the perception of the viewer. What is normally perceived in a casual way now becomes the protagonist. Katherine Newbegin The depiction of found, present-day situations and the highlighting of the effects of constant decay form the focus of Katherine Newbegin's works. The artist photographs interiors of abandoned hotels and holiday camps, investigating the similarities of architecture and interior. Even with the departure of the former residents, these spaces still hold melancholic traces of memory.   Danica Phelps Danica Phelps' Stripe Paintings record the economic conditions of her artistic production, recapitulating the information in diary-like form. Using a colour system the pictures depict the artists expenditure and income: a red stripe stands for a dollar spent, a green for a dollar received; grey is for credit. Now all colour bars are held in earth tones and relate only to her production. Phelps thus creates a sensitive and systematic document of her life, and addresses the monetary value of her creative work in the context of everyday economic transactions. Sebastian Pöllmann Pöllmann's drawn animations present the viewer with fanciful scenarios. The pencil drawings, which are partly accompanied by sound and humorous narratives, use irony to convey interpersonal problems. A critical worldview and a sense of seriousness are not lost in these works, however. Rather, Pöllmann detaches a few precarious situations, "playing" them deliberately in the direction of the viewer. Sibylle Rath A central focus of the artist is the role of the figure and its movement in pictorial space. The works do not have a unified style, but dissolve into ciphers and signs that are then incorporated into Sybille Rath's personal iconography. The result is a re-evaluation of figuration and abstraction, gesture and sculpture, whose force comes above all from the dynamic collision of colour. Carsten Recksik Carsten Recksik is interested in public space, particularly the spaces of the art scene and the art market. The artist presents the viewer with a terrain that is normally inaccessible. He risks and documents the view behind the scenes of the international art business and openly questions the increasing event character of the exhibition trade. In doing so, however, he is not playing the role of a dour art critic. Rather, he approaches the subject in an ironic and playful way. Wolfgang Stehle Wolfgang Stehle's work deals with aspects of inter-urban cultural landscapes such as motorway bridges, electricity pylons or trucks, whereby a key role is played by "social ornament". Stehle observes everyday processes of behaviour and movement, and transforms these into animated, socially coded ornamental patterns of movement, in which energy is released through a sudden effect of force. Xenia Liebl