Re­bec­ca Horn

Rebecca Horn's (born 1944, Germany) transmedia life's work, which spans six decades, deals with the theme of existence and the blurring of the boundaries between nature and culture, technology and biological capital, and the human and the non-human. Whether you call the artist an inventor, director, author, composer or poet, she sees herself above all as a choreographer. Horn describes her practice as precisely calculated relationships of space, light, physicality, sound and rhythm that form an ensemble. Becoming machines, becoming animals or becoming earthly in her performative, sculptural and filmic works aim at a presence that can be experienced by bodies, a visible, tangible and audible existence.

The exhibition “Rebecca Horn” develops a reading dedicated to performativity that can be experienced from its beginnings to the final works. Horn uses the idea of incorporation and creates symbols of technical physical networking from her first works on paper in the 1960s, the early performances and films of the 1970s to the mechanical sculptures since the 1980s and the expansive installations of the 1990s to the present day. Virtuously interwoven references from literature, art and film history run through her entire life's work. Horn's work is a lifelong and explosive exploration of the progressive decentering of humanity.

The exhibition is funded by the Federal Cultural Foundation. The catalog is published by Spector Books.

Curated by Jana Baumann with Radia Soukni.