10 October 2019

Helga Paris, Photographer
8 November 2019 – 12 January 2020

Invitation to the Press Preview:
Wednesday, 6 November 2019, 11 am

Exhibition halls open at 10:30 am
Followed by a press tour with the curator Inka Schube
Akademie der Künste, Pariser Platz 4, 10117 Berlin
Please register at: tel. 030 200 57-1514 or presse@adk.de

With
Jeanine Meerapfel, filmmaker and President of the Akademie der Künste
Inka Schube, curator and art scholar
Helke Misselwitz, filmmaker and Deputy Director of the Film and Media Arts Section, Akademie der Künste
Werner Heegewaldt, Director of the Archives
Moderation Cornelia Klauß, Secretary of the Film and Media Arts Section, Akademie der Künste

From 8 November 2019, the Akademie der Künste on Pariser Platz will present the photography of Helga Paris (born 1938) from the period of 1968 until 2011. Featuring approx. 275 works, including many individual images and series on view for the first time, it will be her most comprehensive exhibition to date. Excerpts from the series Leipzig, Hauptbahnhof (1981/82), Moskau (1991/92) and Mein Alex (2011), among others, will be exhibited for the first time.

The series Leipzig, Hauptbahnhof (1981/82) captures the microcosm of a train station in a city rich in tradition and frequented for its trade fairs; the result is a profound and multifaceted portrait of society. Helga Paris took photographs on the platforms, in the hall, in the restaurant and its kitchen, of travellers waiting and hurrying, and of the people who work at these places. They are silent, precise observations of everyday life, always saturated with the melancholy of an unredeemed promise of cosmopolitanism.

Moskau (1991/92) features intense, surreal street scenes taken during those years of personal uncertainty caused by the political situation. In this series, Helga Paris's imagery is steeped in seemingly unreal but very tangible absurdity. As with her work in Leipzig, she calls up an array of references – from the burning palaces of the revolution and the utopian promise of the post-revolutionary period to Bulgakov's The Master and Margarita – and the arrival of Coca-Cola.
Mein Alex (2011) is Helga Paris's most recent series. These ten photographs describe a kind of phenomenological experience of the square Alexanderplatz. Indeed, it is about the timeless experience of a place profoundly familiar to her, based on a bodily memory.

An exhibition of the Akademie der Künste in cooperation with ifa (Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen). Part of 30th Anniversary of the Peaceful Revolution – Fall of the Berlin Wall (30 Jahre Friedliche Revolution – Mauerfall), a comprehensive project of Kulturprojekte Berlin GmbH. With the kind support of the Alfried Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach-Stiftung, which has enabled the cataloguing of the living legacy and the production of new prints from three unpublished series. Helke Misselwitz's documentary film triptych on the life and work of Helga Paris was made possible with funding from the DEFA Foundation and the Film University Babelsberg Konrad Wolf.

Exhibition information
Helga Paris, Photographer
8 November 2019 – 12 January 2020
Tue – Sun 11 am – 7 pm
Admission € 6/4, free admission for under 19s and Tuesdays from 3 pm
Free admission on 8 and 9 November as part of 30th Anniversary of the Peaceful Revolution – Fall of the Berlin Wall, a comprehensive project of Kulturprojekte Berlin GmbH
Tickets: Tel. +49 (0)30 20057-1000, ticket@adk.de, www.adk.de/tickets
Akademie der Künste, Pariser Platz 4, 10117 Berlin

Exhibition opening on Thursday, 7 November 2019, 7 pm
With Jeanine Meerapfel (President of the Akademie der Künste), Klaus Lederer (Senator for Culture and Europe), Ellen Strittmatter (ifa, Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen), Inka Schube (curator)
Singing: Nino Sandow

Curator's tour with Inka Schube on Sunday, 24 November, noon

Helga Paris archive presentation on Thursday, 5 December, 7 pm

Closing event and book release Helga Paris: Leipzig Hauptbahnhof 1981/82
on Sunday, 12 January 2020, 7 pm

Press images: https://www.adk.de/de/presse/pressematerial.htm