The increasing demand for security, privatization, commercialization and virtual platforms like Google Maps, Twitter and Facebook have led to a fundamental change in the nature of the public sphere and public space. Every last corner of the city is monitored by CCTV cameras, every public gathering requires an official permit, former public squares are being converted into outdoor cafés and beer gardens and the state would like nothing more than “transparent people” posting private information about themselves and making it accessible to the general public. The exhibition project Inside the City highlights the changed configurations in and around public space and investigates how they are now perceived, what mechanisms are at play here and what strategies are have emerged within art in response to these developments.

In keeping with their respective profiles, the three institutions of GAK Gesellschaft für Aktuelle Kunst, Künstlerhaus Bremen and Centre for Artists‘ Publications focus on different aspects of public space and public sphere in contemporary art. GAK Gesellschaft für Aktuelle Kunst, in Inside the City. Public Space and Free Space, addresses the ambivalent nature of public space, caught between democratic spirit and restrictive reality. Künstlerhaus Bremen, in Inside the City. The Impact of the Digital Sphere on Public Space, focuses on how digital space creates a new dimension of public space, while the Centre for Artists‘ Publications, in Inside the City. Artists; Publications as Art in Public Space, presents art since the 1960s, with all the opportunities and media of the public.

The artistic positions represented as part of Inside the City are thus not confined solely to institutional spaces. They also extend in subject matter and location to form a network of art across Bremen. However, they do not become fixtures in the usual manner of art in public space - like street furniture that owes its location and public reception to bureaucratic permits. Instead, approaches are taken that can rather be perceived at the subliminal level and new forms of articulation are sought, to the point where public space - within the three institutions and within public space itself - becomes the exhibition.

Im Inneren der Stadt (Inside the City) is a song by Hamburg band Kante from their album Zombi, Kitto-Yo 2004.

Curated by Fanny Gonella

Share In cooperation with

GAK Gesellschaft für Aktuelle Kunst
Zentrum für Künstlerpublikationen

With kind support of