Extended opening hours: Every Friday and Saturday, the special exhibition Nan Goldin. This Will Not End Well is open from 10 am to 8 pm.

Tickets

Paul McCarthy. The Box

06.07.2012 to 04.11.2012
Neue Nationalgalerie

The American artist Paul McCarthy (born 1945 in Salt Lake City) has become internationally well known due to his provocative, often socio-critical art installations and performances. His life's work, which he has been creating since the 1960's, was inspired by "primal themes" in American society and is characterized by irony, unmasking and the grotesque, as well as a complex nexus of interaction between media and materials. He makes use of Disneyland, comics, Hollywood and set pieces from art history. In his content-packed performances - which strain the limits of endurance - conceptual art, action painting, surrealism and minimalism seem to shift space. McCarthy introduces moments of the uncanny, of dislocation in space or masquerade, a situation that is reflected in the almost stage-like, three-dimensional collage "The Box" (1999).

With Paul McCarthy's "The Box", the Neue Nationalgalerie reveals one of the artist's key works: an oversized wooden box, into which McCarthy has built his entire studio, i.e. the setting for his creativity and the production of his artworks. The installation appears outwardly to be an inconspicuously simple trunk, yet inside a stunning variety of things that reference not only McCarthy himself, but his extensive creations from the beginning of his career to the present as well. The box with over 3,000 fixed objects from his studio - tables, equipment, tools or boxes - is tilted 90 degrees. Due to the rotation, it becomes an almost surreal spatial experience. This ties into McCarthy's radical performance art and opens up new perspectives on the creative space.

As the single work exhibited in the expansive hall, "The Box" is granted particular significance. The narrowness of the studio - the private space - meets the expansiveness of the surrounding - the public space. At the same time, this artwork relates to the collection housed in the Neue Nationalgalerie, which is exhibited in the basement. Specific points of connection can be found to the cultural assemblage from the 1960's exhibited here (Daniel Spoerris "Snare-picture") or Bruce Nauman's early studio videos ("Bouncing in the Corner"). The view into the studio, a constantly recurring theme by modern artists, is in this version by Paul McCarthy the portrait of an unsparing artist who is willing to reveal everything.

Potsdamer Straße 50
10785 Berlin

wheelchair accessible

U-Bahn: Potsdamer Platz
S-Bahn: Potsdamer Platz
Bus: Potsdamer Brücke, Potsdamer Platz Bhf / Voßstraße, Kulturforum, Philharmonie

Sun 10:00 - 18:00
Mon closed
Tue 10:00 - 18:00
Wed 10:00 - 18:00
Thu 10:00 - 20:00
Fri 10:00 - 18:00
Sat 10:00 - 18:00

Special opening hours during public holidays
Admission to the exhibition Nan Goldin: This Will Not End Well is only offered with a time slot-ticket.

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