One of the largest annual exhibitions of contemporary art in Europe celebrates its 25th anniversary
NordArt has been around for a quarter of a century and has enjoyed a high reputation among artists and visitors for just as long. In 2024, its anniversary year, the show is organising a wealth of special projects and putting the prizewinners of the past two and a half decades centre stage.
Every autumn, NordArt receives around three thousand applications from all over the world. The selected works by two hundred artists tell the story of the visual history of our time
year after year. "Like a seismograph, art records the tremors of society. It reflects the truth and the longings of humanity. Artists all over the world are on their way to build dreams for the future from the experiences of the past. They dig like archaeologists in ancient times, dissect social developments of the present day - and set new utopias against hopelessness“, says Wolfgang Gramm, chief curator at NordArt. This is particularly evident in the art, for which the NordArt Prize and the public prizes have been awarded for many years. A total of 57 prizewinners have been honoured since 2010. They will all be the focus of the 2024 anniversary edition of the exhibition with their works in and around the halls of the historic Carlshütte iron foundry.
The youngest NordArt prizewinner is Lubo Mikle from Slovakia, who places red and blue containers on top of each other, so that they seem to float in the former industrial plant. Elements of recycling, industrial art, large-scale dimensions, destructive fury and transformation are united in his work - or, as Hans- Julius Ahlmann, host at the Kunstwerk Carlshütte, puts it: “Container as a symbol of the era".
The age of globalisation is largely characterised by these freight containers. Even the Covid 19 pandemic was reflected in a sudden and extreme surplus of containers, as Lubo Mikle reports. Eleven artists from China are among the award winners. The long-standing contacts to the Chinese art scene have repeatedly brought big names from the Middle Kingdom to the exhibition. They have become an important trademark of NordArt. The very first NordArt Prize went to Zeng Chenggang in 2010. His stainless steel sculpture Lotus Gespräche, which symbolises a constant new departure, is on permanent loan to NordArt and witnesses the rebirth of the exhibition every year. At NordArt 2024, 26 artists from China will be represented.
Mongolian contemporary art was the country focus in 2015. Since then, art from Mongolia has always had an important platform at NordArt and captivated visitors. The exhibition in the carriage shed presents a selection of twenty artists who show how tradition and modernity can merge into a unique style. The exhibition is being organised as part of the 50th anniversary of diplomatic relations between Mongolia and Germany.
The project From the Cradle to the Grave by the well- known German artist Willi Reiche shows kinetic interpretations of twelve aspects of human existence. Another solo project, A Sense of Place by British painter Paul Critchley, is a life-size spatial installation that explores the contents of a house and the surroundings of everyday life.
Kunstwerk Carlshütte is a non-profit cultural initiative of the internationally active ACO Group and the towns of Büdelsdorf and Rendsburg and a special place for exhibitions, concerts, readings and cultural events. Its centrepiece is NordArt, which has been held every year in the summer months since 1999.
In addition to the foundry halls with their
22,000 square metres of exhibition space, it also
includes the 80,000 square metre sculpture
park and the ACO carriage shed.
The curators of NordArt are Wolfgang Gramm and Inga Aru. The host and main sponsor at Kunstwerk Carlshütte is the entrepreneurial couple Hans-Julius and Johanna Ahlmann.
