Decolonization, restitution, memory, photography as an instrument of power and liberation – the artist Sara-Lena Maierhofer’s new series of works "Cabinets" moves in these thematic fields. Thus her latest work complex of photographic objects and photograms presents the result of her research on non-European cultural assets in ethnological collections in Germany and Europe, e.g. the Humboldtforum Berlin, the Royal Museum for Central Africa in Tervuren or the Tropenmuseum in Amsterdam. With her "Shelfs" Sara-Lena Maierhofer enters the sensitive interior, the 'belly' of the ethnological collections – the collection depot. Using original-sized replicas of the shelves, the artist generates color photograms in the color laboratory, which function like a negative copy. The shadows of the objects visible in them meet the viewer like 'echo spaces': What culture of memory do we cultivate? Who are we and who do we want to be?

"Through the shadows and walls created in the process, the photographic objects appear slightly fragmented; cross-references to Cubist works emerge, (...). (And) that is indeed very interesting to me: the influences that non-European works of art had on European modernism at the time. Picasso went to the Musée du Trocadéro and was enthusiastic about the masks from various African countries. (...) this art, which is often said to be only handicraft." (Sara-Lena Maierhofer)

Sara-Lena Maierhofer (born 1982 german) studied at the University of Applied Sciences for Photography in Bielefeld. She received various awards such as the DAAD Scholarship for New York (2010), the Wüstenrot Foundation Award (2013), the Kunststiftung Baden-Württemberg Scholarship and the Stiftung Kunstfonds Bonn Working Scholarship (both 2015) and most recently the Project Scholarship including an acquisition of works by DZ Bank Frankfurt/M (2018). The artist has been featured in several institutional exhibitions, for instance at FOAM Amsterdam (2011), at the Kunstverein Friedrichshafen (2017) or "Jungle Paintings" in De Grote Witte Reus in den Haag (2016) among others. Maierhofer is regularly represented in thematic group shows such as the Marta Herford (2019), Kunstverein Wolfsburg (2018), ZKM Karlsruhe (2018), C/O Berlin (2017), Museum für Photographie Braunschweig (2016), Fotogalerie Wien (2014), Deichtorhallen Hamburg (2018, 2012), Fotomuseum Winterthur (2014), Mulhouse Biennale of Photography (2016) and many others.

Thorsten Brinkmann creates his works from a growing collection of found objects: discarded household objects, secondhand clothing, leftover things from middle-class domestic culture, and all types of bulky refuse. With his atmosphere-filled narratives, the artist effortlessly moves between various genres, playing with images that have been carved into our collective memory. The humorous self-portraits, the still lifes and striking draperies he has photographed as well as his paradisical landscapes allude to compositions by old masters from the 16th, 17th and 19th centuries.

Thorsten Brinkmann (born 1971 german) studied at Kunsthochschule Kassel with Prof. Floris M. Neusüss (1994-97) and at Hochschule für Bildende Künste Hamburg with Prof. Bernhard Blume and Prof. Franz Erhardt Walther. His work has been featured in group exhibitions worldwide, such as Deutsches Hygiene Museum, Dresden (2017), Hamburger Kunsthalle (2016), Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt/M (2016), Villa Mondrian, NL (2014) etc. and as well as in soloshows at Gemeente Museum Helmond (2016/17), Rice Univ. Art Gallery, Houston/TX (2016), Museum Kranenburg, Bergen (2015), Palais für aktuelle Kunst, Glückstadt (2014), Houseinstallation, Pittsburgh (2013), Museo Nacional de San Carlos, Mexico City (2012), Kunsthalle zu Kiel (2011), Georg-Kolbe-Museum, Berlin (2010) etc.. Furthermore his works are represented in various public and private collections, e.g. the Museum der Moderne, Salzburg, Fotomuseum Winterthur, the Gemeentemuseum, The Hague, Kunsthalle Bremerhaven and the Falckenberg Collection, Hamburg.