This exhibition checks in on subjectivity in the postmodern era: challenged to remodel itself, its material existence as much as its ideas, it confronts powers both old and new that put their stamps upon it. It encounters the construction of political bodies and representations that have lately taken on something like the feudalist and anti-democratic cast of yore. Where power seeks to maintain continuity, it incorporates a human community’s collective body into a symbolically exalted subject: Long Live the King!

The sewing machine needle goes up and down at a steady pace. The work finished is observed, with equal persistence, by a sliding camera of the Friend of the Moon video. The close look at fabrics and their structure is typical of Tania Nikulina’s work.

Péter Puklus (1980) shows a selection of his newest works adapted to the space of Trafó Gallery. Puklus, born in Cluj-Napoca, graduated at the Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design Budapest, is a pioneer figure of his generation which started experimenting with the intersections of photography, sculpture and installation-art. It is also part of his multi-layered artistic agenda to publish his photo-series in different artist book formats.

Barna Péli as a sculptor is highly committed to anthropocentrism, where his composition of figures as active, ethical agents are always articulated in relation to interpersonal nexus or group dynamics. The body horror-esque aesthetics represents the power situation within these relations, which in an absence of a well-designed surface unveil the ugliness of reality as it is.

Koelnmesse and the Association of German Galleries and Fine Art Dealers are delighted to announce that the winner of this year’s ART COLOGNE Prize is the prominent and committed art collector Julia Stoschek. The award ceremony with invited guests will be held in Cologne’s Historic Town Hall at 10.00 a.m. on Thursday, 19 April 2018.