High Spirits

Monopol is a former industrial site, built in the 1890s on Provinzstraße in Reinickendorf. After being empty for many years, the spirit factory with its old distillery and bunker rooms is now being established as an art venue. On the occasion of Berlin Art Week 2023, a contemporary art exhibition in this factory-turned-art-venue will shed light on the tension between art and the industrial.

What is the role of art in modern industrial societies? On on the one hand, it is fundamentally linked to the socio-economic drivers of these societies, and is inherently tied to the economic sphere. On the other hand, in the secular context of industrial societies art also advances to become a proxy for that which goes beyond a given reality, creating a connection to ›higher spirits‹, channeling quasi-transcendent, quasi-metaphysical forms of meaning. It is this hybrid, if you will, ontologically ambiguous status of the artistic object that—in various ways—resonates in the works of the invited contemporary artists.

Artists: Martin Boyce, Etienne Chambaud, Franka Hörnschemeyer, Julian Irlinger, Isa Melsheimer, Jenna Sutela, Alain Urrutia, Sandra Vásquez de la Horra

Curated by Dorothea von Hantelmann