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HANNAH HÖCH
REVOLUTIONARY OF ART

FROM 22 APRIL TO 14 AUGUST 2016


A tribute to Höch’s oeuvre after 1945 in the anniversary year of Dada

Hannah Höch, Roma, 1925, oil on canvas, 90 x 106 cm © Berlinische Galerie - Landesmuseum für Moderne Kunst, Fotografie und Architektur © VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2016


Hannah Höch (1889–1978) is considered the most important German female artist of classical modernism. As a “revolutionary of art”, she ranks among the most prominent figures linking the emancipatory art of the avant-gardes of the first half of the 20th century with the second. Her life and art were shaped by a revolutionary attitude permeated by the rebellious consciousness of Dada. With the continuation of her work after 1945, Höch became a decisive groundbreaker for a younger generation of artists who in the 1960s took up the utopian-revolutionary potential of 1918.


The Kunsthalle Mannheim presents an exhibition of Hannah Höch’s oeuvre after 1945. It will be the first comprehensive retrospective of the work which she created after the Second World War. The art museum thus continues its series dedicated to significant female artists of the 20th and 21st century – from Germaine Richier via Ré Soupault to Magdalena Jetelová, Nairy Baghramian, and Pipilotti Rist.


There is still a lot to be discovered in Hannah Höch’s work that spans more than 60 years, from 1916 to 1979, since the artist was appraised almost exclusively as the grande dame of Dadaism after the Second World War. This one-sided focus on her Dadaistic work of the 1920s has shaped the artist’s image until today – obstructing the view to her post-war oeuvre.


The exhibition will address both Dada’s revolutionary conception of the world, which was a fundamental idea of Hannah Höch’s oeuvre, and the diversity of her work. In 1918, the artist introduced the collage into fine art as an independent, extremely effective medium. It remained her most important form of expression throughout her career. Her collage “Entartet” (Degenerated) with a shiny silver corsage and pointed cone-shaped breasts became legendary: As the incarnation of seduction and decay, it is merely an empty shell, headless, with flies swarming around it.


By focusing on the Höch’s oeuvre after 1945, the Kunsthalle Mannheim acknowledges the artist’s entire artistic work and highlights her key role in the context of modernism and the 20th century. The curators Dr. Inge Herold and Dr. Karoline Hille present more than 150 exhibits, structured in eight groups of themes. They also include works that have never been exhibited so far.


KUNSTHALLE MANNHEIM Friedrichsplatz 4 68165 MANNHEIM
INFORMATION: • Phone: +49 621 2936413
• Site: www.kunsthalle-mannheim.de/en
• E-mail : kunsthalle@mannheim.de

OPENING TIMES: • Tuesday through Sunday and Bank Holidays: 11AM to 6PM
• Wednesday: 11AM to 8PM.
• Closed on Mondays, on 24 and 31 December.
ADMISSION PRICES: • Adult: €9
• Reduced: €6
• Family: €15
• Children under 6 years: Free
PRESS CONTACT: Tanja Binder
• Phone: +49 (0)621 293-6433
tanja.binder@mannheim.de

CURATORS: • Dr. Inge Herold
• Dr. Karoline Hille
CATALOGUE: Hannah Höch. Revolutionärin der Kunst (“Hannah Höch. Revolutionary of Art”), Edition Braus Berlin, 240 pages, €24.50 at the museum’s shop. With essays by Ralf Burmeister, Inge Herold, Karoline Hille, Jochen Hörisch, and Beate Reese.