Out of the Box 3: Traces of Interest / ifa-Kunstbestand

In the organizer's words:

With the exhibition Out of the Box 3: Traces of Interest, the ifa Gallery continues the program series Out of the Box in 2024, in which the ifa Galleries Stuttgart and Berlin have been inviting international contemporary artists to dialogical encounters with artistic positions of the ifa art collection since 2020.

Traces of Interest is the third part of the artistic-curatorial exploration of the layers and histories of the extensive ifa art collection, which comprises around 23,000 works of contemporary art from the 20th and 21st centuries. The exhibition combines ideas and works from a working process that began in fall 2021 with the artists Isaac Chong Wai, Lizza May David, Wilhelm Klotzek, Ofri Lapid, Adrien Missika and Gitte Villesen. In the previous two-part exhibition project Spheres and Chains of Interest, the artists reflected on and contextualized the ifa's collection and exhibition practice, thus enabling new ways of engaging with the ifa's art holdings.

In the new exhibition Traces of Interest at the ifa Gallery Stuttgart, the works that were created during the process as well as other works from the ifa art collection will be presented in mid-March. These include the work complex Der geschundene Mensch by Günther Uecker and the bronze sculpture Bördevenus (1971) by Heinrich Apel, which was taken from the holdings of the Zentrum für Kunstausstellungen der DDR (ZfK) and is being shown again for the first time in over 30 years. The video work Mütter by Isaac Chong Wai, which was created as part of the project, as well as the video work Strings and Berries by Gitte Villesen, inspired by Hanna Höch's work, expand the ifa art collection with contemporary works. Adrien Missika will take his two-wheeled mobile exhibition space into Stuttgart's urban space during the course of the exhibition.

Traces of Interest brings together critical and humorous questions and perspectives. The exhibition touches on highly topical issues and highlights collective memories and new moments of action.