Second Home Projects is a rentable exhibition space located in Berlin-Wedding, the area with the most affordable studio-space for artists moving to the German capital. The low property prices in this, the city's most Turkish quarter have recently also attracted some commercial galleries to move to the area, including Berlin heavyweight gallerist Max Hetzler. Second Home Projects is a division of Our Second Home, a real estate agent investing in property in the quarter, attracting artists and galleries to settle here - undoubtedly an effort to gentrify the area and increase the value of property.
‘Common Ground' showcases recent works by five artists that have become friends in Berlin by realising a common past - Antwerp. The three women and two men all lived in the city on the river Schelde for various reasons and lengths of time. However, since they have found each other here, they are united by more than a common reminiscence for their stay in Flanders. Undoubtedly, they knew of one another before moving to Berlin, but it is only recently, and perchance, that all have met and seen each other's work.
Organised and curated by the participating artists, with the works in the exhibition arranged neither by artist, nor democratically, but consensually so as not to interfere with one another: a solution only possible for a group of people that genuinely respect each other's work. From outside the passer-by is lured inside the gallery by Maryam Najd's large canvas entitled ‘Bloody Blanket & Bloody Blank XI', 2009, a seductive painting of what appears to be a line of go-go girls with tambourines clad in short skirts drenched in salmon-peach colour that shrouds any signs of vulgarity in beauty. The Iranian artist lived in Antwerp for fifteen years and has been living in Berlin for two years.
The entrance of the exhibition is flanked by an oil painting by Stephan Balleux, the Brussels-born artist, who moved to Berlin in 2007. Entitled ‘Sui Generis', 2009, the over three-metre wide grey-in-grey canvas of a figure sitting on a tree stump and a double melting into him in a way that starkly reminds us of the most memorable scene in James Cameron's ‘Terminator 2', 1991 - the melting figure walking out of the flames of a burning arctic truck. Balleux has also included a projection of a computer-generated animation, entitled ‘The Apocraphya', 2009, which is projected in a narrow stairwell leading to the cellar. In it we see, what is best described as a three-dimensional splotch of paint changing shape in an imaginary space defying the laws of gravity. In the same room, Hadassah Emmerich, who studied at the HISK in Antwerp and later moved to Berlin, has included two linocuts that have been mounted on the wall in the first room.
In the second room, a large canvas by Tom Liekens entitled ‘Self Portrait as Artiste Maudit', 2009 shows an unconscious drunk lying lifelessly on the ground in front of a graffiti painted wall. A dog with a pitiful look invokes a feeling of empathy in the viewer, albeit that the unconscious state of the male figure is entirely self-willed. Towards the top left-hand corner, the work becomes more abstract, until finally dirty brown paint runs down the side of the image. Indeed, the rough wall that serves as a backdrop in the depicted scene becomes the surface of the painting. Thus, the viewer can imagine peeling away the scene to unveil an abstract canvas.
On our way to the third room, our gaze falls upon a monitor placed on the floor in the corridor. We see an animated drawing of a woman eating green grapes, a work by Haleh Redjaian. The short sequence is played in a continuous loop, which makes it seem as though there is an endless supply of the fruit paired with an insatiable appetite. Most of the smaller back room is filled with delicate drawings on paper by the German artist, whose work has developed nicely towards making minimal suggestive marks of specific real-life situations: facades, stacked cups, legs and a square of white paint fastened to the paper with four strips of coloured sticky-tape.
Although it was not a curated exhibition, the works suit each other. In ‘Common Ground', the artists have shown great care and respect. Whether it is a common past in Belgium, a shared presence in Berlin or four pieces of sticky-tape, something holds this exhibition together.
David ULRICHS
‘Common Ground' with Stephan Balleux (B), Haddassah Emmerich (NL), Tom Liekens (B), Maryam Najd (IN), Haleh Redjaian (DE) ran from
3 December till 12 December 2009 in Second Home Projects, Berlin.