Opening of the exhibition: with current/against electricity. Contemporary Photographic Interventions

Imagine yourself as a photographer who has the need to go outside to take new pictures. How will we understand going “outside” today? And how will we know if the photographs will be “new”? What role does photography play as a means of artistic expression at a time when everything has already been photographed, and the world is flooded with an endless stream of images circulating on the web? What topics should be taken up today and how should this be done?

Artists/Artists:

#1 Viktoria Binschtock

#2 Michael Schafer

#3 Sebastian Stumpf

#4 Taiyo Honorato & Nico Krebs

Exhibition opening: 6.11.2026 (Friday), 19.00

Exhibition tour: 7.11.2026 (Saturday), 11.00

Language: vernissage in Polish and English; translation: Agata Oborska

Where: Labirynt Gallery, 5 Fr. J. Popiełuszki Street, Lublin

Exhibition open until: 10.01.2027 (Tue. -Sun., 12.00-19.00)

Admission is free

A series of exhibitions “with the current/against the current. Contemporary Photographic Interventions” shows the works of artists who live in Germany, have developed their own distinctive language of visual creation and struggle from the ground up with the medium of artistic expression that is photography. The presented works draw attention to the phenomenon of visual overload both as a tool and a subject of analysis, exploring new forms of visual reality in order to critically examine the society that confronts photography. Regardless of the motivation of the artists or the content that interests them, in their work they intervene in the basic matter of the image and in the external reality. At the same time, they leave unanswered the question of whether this work can still be called “documentary” or whether it can be a form of realism that permeates fiction.

Galeria Labirynt hosts the first two in a series of exhibitions, each taking on a different theme. The series was inaugurated by an exhibition hosted in international galleries since 2016, during which Viktoria Binschtok and Michael Schäfer presented their work. Artists use and reflect images taken from the media, analyzing their diverse ways of functioning. Binschtok and Schäfer also address the growing autonomy of images in a networked world that will be dominated by digital algorithms in the future. In this respect, their work corresponds to the tradition of artistic interest in mass media, the roots of which go back to the 70s of the last century. Binschtok and Schäfer represent a new generation of artists who are expanding the concept of photography and its documentary potential.

Viktoria Binschtok (born 1972) combines the real world of the streets with its representation in the digital sphere to show us how photographs on the Internet not only no longer reflect reality, but even recreate it. It uses both its photographs and images from the Internet and other media, which are increasingly subjected to the domination of digital algorithms. The artist leans on the randomness of these new visual formats and challenges their potential in a contemptuous way. Through its creative approach, it offers insight into the paradoxes and distortions of the new visual regime, although at the same time it is an order determined by mathematical and economic principles.

Michael Schäfer (born 1964) reflects on the excessive significance of photography in the traditional print press, as well as examines the nature of amateur video recordings. It analyzes the diverse ways in which images function, their excess of meanings and importance, which literally confronts the viewer with a tangle of historical and political conditions served as a finite and closed interpretation. Schäfer removes the faces of the real heroes of the articles from the found photographs and replaces them with his own photographs of the actors. As part of this process, the dots and pixels of the printed images collide with the extremely sharp fragments of the artist's photography. Schäfer positions himself in relation to photography through creative imitation, creatively integrating photographs into his works in order to deconstruct them.

The second exhibition, which travels since 2019 and presents works by Sebastian Stumpf and Taiyo Onorato & Nico Krebs, unites two artistic approaches. They focus on the exploration of the urban characteristics that visually shape our everyday life, as well as on the often overlooked, functional construction materials of the city. Artists analyze architectural space as a materialized means of expression of society, looking at the existing urban order by making visible gaps in the structure of the city. Through performative interventions, artists comment on contemporary urban life and its visual representation in a perverse and sometimes ironic way. They subversely and even acrobatically test the limits of their own means of expression, using visual tricks and illusions to create an atmosphere of tension and surprising effects.

Sebastian Stumpf (born 1980) creates a connection between his own body and urban space, urban infrastructure and passers-by. The artist uses a closing garage door and urban architectural structures on the coast of Portugal to carry out small interventions, which he always makes on his own. Taking advantage of the game between the show and the shot, Stumpf breaks the established urban order with seemingly absurd sequences of movement. By repeating the same movements in different locations seen in his photographs and video recordings, he makes our perception of urban love of order shift towards individualism. The artist contrasts his own actions with the purely observant gaze of the camera, thus expressing his position.

Through insightful observations, optical illusions and subtle constructions, Taiyo Onorato & Nico Krebs (born 1979) focus our attention on cultural nuances. Their photographs and film installations not only show real urban assumptions, but also use small interventions to analyze our ideas and stereotypes, which we project on the presented works. For the ifa exhibition, works have been selected that were created in Berlin and in which we can see the back of the restored streets, as well as places undiscovered by tourists, to which Google Street View will not take us. Using ordinary roof beams, pyrotechnic effects and optical shifts, the artists pay attention to the reality and myth of Berlin perceived as an endless concrete desert. Their photographs intelligently dismiss the aura of mystery with details that balance construction and deconstruction.

Head of Art Department: Dr. Ellen Strittmatter

Curated by Florian Ebner and Christin Müller

Realization and organization: Alexander Lisewski

Edited by Frank Marks, Thomas Kaufhold

Project partner: Goethe-Institut

Coordination: Dorota Swinarska, Goethe-Institut in Warsaw

Realization of the exhibition in the Labirynt Gallery:

Director of the Labirynt Gallery: Barbara Sawicka

Produced by: Diana Kołczewska, Gabriela Gawęda

Corporate identity: Florentyna Nastaj

Promotion: Alicja Gieleta

Editing: Jarosław Mitura, Adam Oroń, Rafał Garula

Exhibition organized by ifa — Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen www.ifa.de, in cooperation with the Goethe Institute and the Labirynt Gallery.

ifa — Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen e. V. is funded by the Federal Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Germany, the state of Baden-Württemberg and the city of Stuttgart.