Chicken in the Woods

Chicken in the Woods
- Performance & Installation by Laura Heyer & Mariana Nicotra
Based on field research by Sophia Reidl and Dr. Oksana Zaporozhetc on the former Joint Headquarters (JHQ) Rheindahlen


Birds chirping. Branches and leaves dance in the wind; bees flit through the tall, unmowed gardens; the sun shines brightly on crumbling asphalt. Nature is fighting its way back into harmony. Deafening silence. Then, broken doors and windows; plaster that has fallen from the ceiling onto the damp carpeted floors, lying there like a shattered mirror. Cobwebs adorn the hallways. The door to the basement stands open, as does the hatch to the attic. Fear of what might be. Fear of what may have been. Fleeting glimpses into a story that will never be fully told—hidden like a ghost behind the remnants of a bygone world. Even where everything seems to stand still, change is taking place.


How much of what once was—or could have been—do we dare to see? What is allowed to be lost? What are we willing to let go of?


The performance “Chicken in the Woods, ” which will take place on August 21 and 22, 2026, at Kunsthaus 2N60 in Mönchengladbach, explores precisely these questions. As an artistic response to the former Joint Headquarters Rheindahlen (JHQ), it explores the beauty and horror of decay and leaves the future of the past to the ghostly hands of absence. From August 22 to 27, traces of the performance will remain in the space as an installation and can be viewed from the outside. The event concludes with a closing reception on August 28, featuring a conversation with the artists, a discussion of the findings from the previous research project on the JHQ, a historical context provided by Dr. Bettina Blum, and an open forum for eyewitnesses.


The exhibition was initiated by social anthropologist and doctoral candidate Sophia Reidl and developed in collaboration with artists Laura Heyer and Mariana Nicotra. It emerged from ethnographic field research conducted as part of the international project funded by the Gerda Henkel Foundation Cities “becoming lost”: the ruptures of grand narratives of modernity.


🗓️Performances: August 21 & 22 | Open discussion on August 28
⏰ Doors open at 6:00 p.m., events begin at 6:30 p.m.
📍 Free admission: Kunsthaus 2N60, Waldhausener Str. 62, 41061, Mönchengladbach