Masculinities

The starting point for the exhibition project and the accompanying catalogue is the heterogeneity and flexibility of male identity models, whereby it also reflects on the definition of „male images“ through the media: the spectrum ranges from an adoption of diverse media-created male roles by the artist, to a hypertrophied presentation of „typically male“ behaviour patterns, to portrait sequences of members of a specific group, and to questioning specific roles in a specific society.
Another vital aspect supplements the given themes of the exhibition: in western societies, we frequently fail to apply the image of a flexible, „extendible“ male identity to (male) immigrants, as is demonstrated especially when we observe the present status of men from the Middle East: for example, western societies are attempting to promote a change (in the sense of triggering a „liberation“ from religious rules) with regard to (Moslem) female immigrant identity, while the male immigrant identity - in the sense of machismo - is interpreted as static, „hopelessly backward“, traditional and thus impossible to change. The exhibition „Masculinities“ includes works which question such clichéd ideas and aim to counteract them.