DIE HABEN EINEN VOGEL (“For Birds’ Sake”) – The „Vogelmänner“ (The Birdmen) of Istanbul : 30 years a gallerist, an anniversary exhibition by Christiane Bühling-Schultz
 
Sonja Alhäuser, Amador, Andreas Amrhein, Axel Anklam, Angelika Arendt, Said Baalbaki, Norbert Bisky, Ali Kaaf, Michael Kalmbach, Helge Leiberg, Jan Muche, A.R. Penck, Franziska Reinbothe, Cornelia Schleime, Nadja Schöllhammer, Niels Sievers, Roland Stratmann, Matthias Stuchtey, Lubomir Typlt, Roger Wardin, Jan Wattjes, Maik Wolf, Filip Zorzor
 
26. Oktober – 30. November 2019/October 26 – November 30, 2019
Vernissage: Samstag, 26. Oktober 2019, 19-21 Uhr/Opening: Saturday, October 26, 2019, 7-9 pm
 
Es erscheint ein Katalog, 42 S., 20 €./A catalogue will be published, 42 pp., 20 €.

Franziska Reinbothe, ohne Titel/untitled, 2019, Holz, Chiffon/wood, chiffon, ca. 110 x 50 x 4 cm

After 30 years as a gallery owner in Berlin, more than two decades of which was as a partner at Galerie Michael Schultz and, for the last five years, at C&K Galerie with Karin Rase, this thematic group exhibition shows many of the artists who have accompanied Christiane Bühling during these years. Some years ago, through the article “Die haben einen Vogel” (For birds’ Sake) by Tillmann Prüfer in ZEIT MAGAZIN (3. Dez. 2015, Nr. 49), she came across the theme of the „Vogelmänner“ (Birdmen) of Istanbul. This was in an article about a photo project by Cemre Yeşil and Maria Sturm. It is an old custom in which men with their veiled bird cages meet in selected cafés in the city to let their precious songbirds enter a singing competition. Wild goldfinches, greenfinches and others are captured. This tradition is now threatened with extinction. This little story is both controversial and touching.

The artists have dealt with it in paintings, drawings and sculptures under overriding questions that are of significance in our complex and constantly changing world: What do traditions mean to us? What is worth preserving for us? What is no longer contemporary? What culturally different traditions are there that may be appreciated in one culture but disdained in another? What about our passions? Do we still have time and leisure to devote ourselves to them? How about hasty moral categorizations and judgements? Are we still listening to what the other has to say? How trapped are we by black and white thinking?

The result is a multifaceted clash of the most diverse artistic approaches to the subject, which plumbs the ambivalence of utopia, freedom and poetry in many layers. Only in a few exceptional cases did we have to resort to existing works, all others were created exclusively for the exhibition.

Press
taz – die tageszeitung, “Männer, die Vögel fangen”, Brigitte Werneburg (German)

Biographies by request