Klaus Merkel's paintings from the Kienzle Collection meet digital works from the Wrong Format collection by Curio Fringe, Danilo Xhema, Cydr, Lorna Mills, Andreas Gysin, Waffles, No Hygiene, Diewiththemostlikes and Lee Mullican, from 1980s computer images to contemporary internet art.
Curated by Max Mayer, the exhibition brings together two private collections: painting and conceptual art from the Kienzle Collection, and digital art from the 1980s to today from Wrong Format.
In 1986 and 1987, the painter Lee Mullican began making images on a computer as part of UCLA's Program for Technology in the Arts. He saw the computer as an extension of painting and was drawn to chance and to the unexpected results of computer-assisted image production. Andreas Gysin uses the structures of programming itself to generate images. According to the exhibition text, Curio Fringe, Lorna Mills, Cydr and Danilo Xhema draw on the visual languages of the internet and connect them to painting and portraiture, while Waffles, No Hygiene and Diewiththemostlikes work with the abject and with visual overload. Klaus Merkel shows three paintings from 1980, 1996 and 2024; next to the digital works, they share an interest in repetition and in layering visual information.
On 18 November at 7 pm, Anika Meier and Max Mayer discuss What Makes an Image Art? From Painting to Digital Image Culture, asking how artists produce and transform images at a time when many are generated through automated processes.
The exhibition has been extended to the end of November and stays open for Charlottenwalk on 27 and 28 November.
