Kunsthalle Praha is pleased to present Gregor Hildebrandt: A Blink of an Eyeand the Years are Behind Us („Ein Wimpernschlag und hinter uns dieJahre“) – covering over 20 years of the artist’s practice. Curated by ChristelleHavranek, Chief Curator of Kunsthalle Praha, the exhibition will also inaugurate anew programme of solo exhibitions by major living artists.
As an artist who suggests but never reveals, Hildebrandt plays with secrecy and unpredictability, preferring to trust his audience’s capacity for imagination and ability to maketheir own references. In this sense, he regards viewers as the co-creators of his work,and invites them to join him in rediscovering the past in the largest retrospective dedicated to his work so far.
Featuring over 80 pieces spread across two galleries, including new and site-specificworks, the exhibition will encompass sculptures, paintings, assemblages, installations,and more. Hildebrandt is best known for working with analogue sound storage mediums, a choice of materials that reflects his intense love of music, yet never does asound emanate from his artworks. Instead, sound and lyrics are embedded in the materials themselves, existing only implicitly through titles that inform us partially abouttheir nature. Hildebrandt’s work makes formal references to Minimalism and Abstract Expressionism, and it is also nourished by a multitude of literary, cinematographic, musical and architectural influences. He uses these cultural sources to trigger both collective and personal memories.
For this exhibition, Hildebrandt will transform the spaces of Kunsthalle Praha allowingfor objects and architectural elements to merge. Large-scale installations punctuatedby new, lesser-known, and iconic artworks promise to draw the audience directly intothe artist’s idiosyncratic world and provide a broad view of his artistic practice.
Furthermore, the exhibition space will occasionally be turned into a venue for concertsand events organised by Hildebrandt himself, bringing his artistic community directly toKunsthalle Praha. Since 2017, Hildebrandt has been inviting his contemporaries toshow their work in a dedicated exhibition space called Grzegorzki Shows. This smallspace, once a gatekeeper’s house in his studio building in Berlin, has been identicallyreproduced at Kunsthalle Praha complete with green linoleum floors and a pink neonsign. Over the course of the exhibition, a selection of ‘shows’ that Hildebrandt previously curated will be reproduced as sub-exhibitions in the space. Additionally, Hildebrandt will invite bands to perform at Kunsthalle Praha from Grzegorzki Records, an indie label he co-founded with his partner, Alicja Kwade.
