Opening: May 13, 2023
Exhibition Duration: May 13 - June 10, 2023
Opening Hours: Tue - Sat (except Thu) from 12 to 7pm
Guided Tour with Daniel Lie, and Finissage: June 10, 2023, 5 pm
Location: Zwingli-Kirche, Rudolfstr. 14, 10245 Berlin
entrance at the corner of Danneckerstrasse/Rudolfstrasse
near Warschauer Straße Station (S/U1/U3)
www.speakingtoancestors.de
Personal memories, as well as cultural objects and products of nature that endure in the world for a long time, form the core of Daniel Lie‘s artistic practice. More recently, forms of mourning and commemoration have been added, as well as processes of collective healing. In the interdisciplinary exchange between ecology, archaeology and ancestor worship, their work questions Western science and religion and the binary thought structures imposed by them.
With the expansive installation The Unloved Ones Lie responds to the architecture and history of the Zwingli Church in Berlin, Friedrichshain, as part of the exhibition series Speaking to Ancestors. Founded in 1908, the church has undergone many transformations since the division and reunification of Berlin, from usage of temporary archives to youth clubs. Today, it functions as a social space where care is practiced, as well as a church where religious services and church festivities take place. These multifaceted connotations become reference points for the artistic reflection on political power structures and beliefs that can be found in sacred as well as profane spaces.
The Unloved Ones consists of sculptural units of turmeric-dyed fabrics recycled from Lie‘s previous work, Grieving Secret Society (2022, Carnegie Museum of Art). The works float above the pews on a centered level. This kind of recycling is an ongoing interaction in which Lie connects spaces and forms of mourning and remembering.
Inspired by the Bronze Age offering well Lie encountered while researching indigenous rituals in Berlin, they explored healing and intoxicating pre-Christian rituals. The textile sculptures, sewn in various forms and sometimes filled with earth and medicinal herbs, contrast the rigidity of the altar and the patriarchal figures of the neo-Gothic church with their fluid, plural forms. The Unloved Ones is a choreography of abstract groups of figures far from pictorial representations from forgotten myths and marginalized religions that were forgotten, repressed, and politically mystified (or misused) with the advent of Christianity.
By making visible materials that are always in transformation, conditioned by their performative properties - time, transience, and presence - Lie‘s works underscore the inti-
mate yet expansive coexistence of beings, and address our ongoing participation in
the processes of living, dying, and decaying. The energy of these transformations unfolds through the scent of herbs, the smell of earth, and the changing natural color of turmeric when exposed to light. In this interplay, visitors and users of the Zwingli Church are invited to become part of the installation in which different entities and „The Unloved Ones“ co-exist.
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Daniel Lie, (b. 1988) is a gender-nonconforming artist who lives and works in Berlin. They have had recent solo exhibitions at New Museum, New York; Kunstlerhaus Bethanien, Berlin; Casa do Povo, São Paulo; Jupiter Artland, Edinburgh; Performeum/Vienna Festwochen, Vienna; Change-Change, Budapest; Kampnagel, Hamburg; and Centro Cultural São Paulo. Their work has been presented in numerous group exhibitions, including at the Singapore Biennale 2022, the 58th Carnegie International; the Museum of Modern Art, Rio de Janeiro; Atonal Festival, Berlin; Solar dos Abacaxis, Rio de Janeiro; Cemeti Institute for Art and Society, Yogyakarta; Valongo Festival, Santos; Osage Foundation, Hong Kong; 14th Yogyakarta Biennale; Frestas–Art Triennial, Sorocaba; MuseumsQuartier, Vienna.
https://liedaniel.com.br/
