“Recollection”, according to Kierkegaard, is a turn from a real-life present to a past that used to be but is no more. “Going back to the past”, as opposed to recollection, assumes a total loss of the present, a loss which enables the returnee to find himself once more at the starting point. Whoever truly seeks to return to the past, rather than just recollect it, must therefore risk his present, his existence, and thereby regain it. The third-generation artists in this exhibition return to Berlin to seek its formative moments – Berlin of the Third Reich, of the Weimar Republic, of the Great War, and of the turn of the century. By touching the great icons of the war and German culture, while adopting the practices of historical research and artistic reference, they mirror the indirect move in which they turn back towards themselves and offer an attempt to capture part of the past.

The exhibitions are sponsored by Goethe Institut, Schir, and the Berlin Senate Cultural Department.

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