We are organizing an exhibition that looks back at the last ten years of the artist residency. A comprehensive catalogue will be published and some of our former residence artists will visit us again. Save the date!

"Process as Resistance, Resilience and Regeneration“
“Process as Resistance, Resilience and Regeneration“ looks at art as a statement, a tool to take action and to examine complex layers of our living conditions. Instead of suggesting potential solutions, the catalyst potential inherent to the arts is rather to point to the actual questions and to raise awareness. The exhibition therefore sets up a specific context for such “’catalysing figures’ (…) capable of inventing and activating new visions of a reality of which countless details tend to slip unnoticed past the common gaze, influenced not only by the stereotypes broadly promoted in the mass media, but also by a widespread amnesia with regard to civil and human rights”.[1]

The exhibition unfolds along three angles of process-oriented work. This includes processes informing the work prior to production, processes unfolding in the very moment of production and processes taking place as a rather sustainable result. While the first is mostly related to community knowledge, cultural and biographical background, the second can be perceived as an energy unfolding at the moment of producing and exhibiting work, such as synergies created through collaboration and network. The third chapter embraces methods of outreach and activating people that manifest as rather sustainable effects, such as creating awareness, promoting resistance, taking action and lastly advancing social change.

“Process as Resistance, Resilience and Regeneration“ is organized on the occasion of the tenth anniversary of the artist residency CAT Cologne. With its focus on socially engaged and community-based work, CAT has hosted numerous international artists. To respond to the fact that the projects usually set focus on processes stipulated during the residencies and mostly manifest outside the white cube, works deriving from these and related projects are now translated into an exhibition context. They are further complemented with works by artists associated to the program.

The exhibition is located in an urban setting, in a railway arch near the main train station. This place, which is both protected yet characterized by mobility and transit, offers an ideal environment to experience the process-oriented work. The Public space is informed by permanent negotiation, thus critically engaging with the fixiticy of formal structures. The exhibition takes into account the transformative character and effects of the works and will be altered throughout time. Special events such as artist talks, Dinner Partys, performances and music will be framing the exhibition. Most of the artists will be present for the opening thereby providing the most important resource for all of the work featured in the exhibition itself: people. A documentation of all projects of the past ten years of CAT Cologne will be available throughout the exhibition. A catalogue will be published at the closing of the exhibition.

[1] Ambrozoic, Mara, “Regeneration”, in: “Art as a Thinking Process. Visual Forms of Knowledge Production” ed. by Ambrozoic, Mara, and Vettese, Angela, 2013, pp 30-38, p. 33.

Curated by Julia Haarmann and Khanyisile Mbongwa.

Supported by:
Kulturamt der Stadt Köln
Ministerium für Kultur und Wissenschaft des Landes NRW
L△G Soziokultureller Zentren NRW