Philara Collection: Paul Hance

Philara Collection presents “Melting Sands” with works with Paul Hance.

18 October 2025 – 25 January 2026

To mark the 150th anniversary of the former Lennarz Glassworks—whose converted factory has housed the Philara Collection since 2016—the exhibition Melting Sands explores glass as one of the most paradoxical and transformative materials in contemporary art. Bringing together international artists such as Gabriele Beveridge, Narges Mohammadi, Jeremy Shaw, Slavs and Tatars and Paul Hance, the show reflects on how structure and chaos, light and opacity, fragility and permanence coexist within this medium.

Glass, long seen as a metaphor for transparency and utopia, is revisited here as a substance of instability and metamorphosis—an amorphous solid in constant potential for change. The works on view question what can be learned from glass today: its reflective, connective, and collective properties, and its role in a world that blurs boundaries between material and immaterial.

Within this dialogue, Paul Hance presents works that investigate the fluid, cyclical nature of perception and life. His Rasaseries employs Bohemian glass and silver leaf to create reflective surfaces that capture transient, fragmented images—moments of self-perception in motion. In Investigating the Mystery of the Moon, a Parisian cast-iron tree grate frames a pink-gold disc of hand-blown glass, linking urban memory, material alchemy, and the enduring mystery of transformation .

Driftless by Felipe Castelblanco in Oldenburg


Driftless by Felipe Castelblanco Pulverturm, Oldenburg

Sept 6– Dec. 14 , 2025

We are pleased to announce that Felipe Castelblanco’s video installation Driftless is currently on view at Haus der Medienkunst, Oldenburg, presented in the atmospheric setting of the Pulverturm.

On view from Sept 6 to December 14, 2025Driftless is a three-channel video work that explores the ocean as a radical and unbounded public space. Developed over seven years of performative journeys across bodies of water in Colombia, North America, Europe, and beyond, the work reflects on movement, migration, and the porous nature of political and physical boundaries.

Emerging from Castelblanco’s experience on Colombia’s Pacific coast—where he once purchased a piece of land that was later claimed by the ocean—Driftless transforms personal history into poetic reflection. The piece engages with water as space, nationhood as confinement, and seafaring as both resistance and aesthetic practice.

Set within the circular architecture of the Pulverturm, the immersive installation invites viewers to enter a meditative drift—between continents, concepts, and currents.

More information:

👉 hausmedienkunst.de/ausstellungen/aktuell/driftless-im-pulverturm


Would you like a German version as well?

Asef/Burckhardt Review at TZK

Asef/Burckhardt exhibition at MOS, reviewed at TZK

Sabeth Buchmann’s insightful review “Matter and Message”, published by Texte zur Kunst, examines how artists Mario Asef and Kirstin Burckhardt critically and poetically revisit the legacy of Anna and Lawrence Halprin. Through archival research, performance, and sculptural installations, both artists reimagine the Halprins’ utopian ideals of collective creativity, ecology, and diversity—while exposing their transformation under neoliberalism.

📖 Read the full text on Texte zur Kunsthttps://www.textezurkunst.de/en/articles/buchmann-matter-message/

Tree of Life

Tree Of Life

„Tree of Life“ ist ein Aquarell der kanadischen Künstlerin Nika Fontaine aus dem Jahr 2017. Nikas Werk ist eine Erkundung des Spirituellen, das in der Kunst ausgedrückt werden kann. Dazu greift sie auf verschiedene Denktraditionen zurück, die sich mit der spirituellen Welt beschäftigen, darunter Religionen, vor allem die jüdisch-christliche, die ihr schon als Kind von ihrem Onkel, einem Franziskanermönch, nähergebracht wurde.

Der Baum des Lebens ist ein universelles Symbol, das in vielen Kulturen und Traditionen weltweit vorkommt.

  • Kabbala (jüdische Mystik): Symbolisiert die göttliche Schöpfung, spirituelle Entwicklung und die Verbindung zwischen Gott und Welt durch die zehn Sephirot.
  • Nordische Mythologie (Yggdrasil): Verbindet die neun Welten, steht für kosmische Ordnung, Leben, Tod und Erneuerung.
  • Keltische Traditionen: Repräsentiert Harmonie, Stärke und die Verbindung von Himmel, Erde und Unterwelt.
  • Christentum: Symbol für Unsterblichkeit (Eden) und Erlösung (Offenbarung), oft mit dem Kreuz verbunden.
  • Mesopotamische Kulturen: Steht für Fruchtbarkeit, göttliche Ordnung und Leben, oft mit Gottheiten wie Inanna verknüpft.
  • Indische/Buddhistische Traditionen: Symbolisiert Erleuchtung (Bodhi-Baum) oder die vergängliche Welt (Ashvattha).
  • Afrikanische Kulturen: Verkörpert Leben, Schutz und Ahnenverbindung, z. B. durch den Baobab.
  • Schamanische/Indigene Traditionen: Dient als Axis Mundi, verbindet Unterwelt, Erde und Himmel, z. B. der Ceiba-Baum bei den Maya.
Taddeo Gandi. 1340. Fresko des Lebensbaums, inspiriert von Bonaventura‘s Der Baum des Lebens (Lignum vitae), im Refektorium des Klosters Santa Croce in Florenz.

Zusammenfassend kann man sagen, dass der Baum des Lebens normalerweise die Verbindung zwischen Himmel, Erde und Unterwelt sowie den Kreislauf von Leben darstellt. In vielen Kulturen steht er für Harmonie, Kraft und Einheit der Schöpfung und des Kosmos.

Die Aquarell spielt eine wichtige Rolle in Nikas Kunst. Sie malt schnell, weil sie einen Kleber benutzt, um den Glitzer auf der Leinwand zu fixieren. Um sich vor dem Malen richtig zu konzentrieren, meditiert sie und skizziert die Motive, die sie malen will.

Aquarelle sind für die Entwicklung ihrer Malerei unverzichtbar, deshalb schätzt sie sie auch so sehr.

Nika Fontaine

Paul Hance & Tadan

Paul Hance in duo show at Wolf Jordan convened By Tadan

With ‚Ria’, Wolff Jordan presents two artistic perspectives that examine — and interactively expand — states within the space-time continuum. Tadan brought together almost all of the participants at some point and convened the exhibition. Only the artists, Tallal Shammout and Paul Hance, had never met before. The show itself — featuring around 15 individual works — becomes a field of research in its own right. Art as a successful experiment: the exhibited works — framed collages and light sculptures by Paul Hance, and images by Tallal Shammout — form an almost uncanny symbiosis. Yet the artistic practice of the two could not be more divergent.

Torstraße 170, 10115 Berlin Mitte
Thursdays apéro, 6–9 pm
Saturdays, 12–6 pm

Rachel Libeskind: Erie Art Museum.

Erie Art Museum presents Rachel Libeskind “The Golden Record”

June 27, 2025 – June 28, 2026

Frenzel Gallery

Beyond the orbit of Pluto and in the depths of interstellar space, NASA’s Golden Record—mounted on the Voyager spacecraft—continues its silent journey through interstellar space. Nearly fifty years ago, scientists compiled images and audio recordings onto a 12-inch gold-plated copper disc as a hopeful message from Earth to other life forms beyond our solar system. The Golden Record represents a time capsule of life on earth in the late 1970s. From nature sounds, music and greetings in numerous languages, to images of earth and mathematic equations, the Golden Record presents what was considered to be the best examples of humankind’s greatest achievements.

Rachel Libeskind’s exhibition The Golden Record draws inspiration from her research within Auburn University’s special collections and the institution’s historical connection to NASA. In response, Libeskind has created a series of sculptural works that act as a set of contemporary time capsules and meditations on human life, knowledge, and activity. Each sculpture represents both a personal and broad examination of humanity’s shared histories and how the objects that we hold closely and sacred are innate to our individual lineages and stories. The disparate items which comprise each sculpture are a range of pieces that are both personal and found objects collected by Libeskind and represents her vision of ephemera which outlines and reconstructs civilization. The architectural assemblages’ reference sacred spaces such as homes, places of worship and sites of labor, three areas which comprise the daily lives of so many on earth. Libeskind’s works—and the exhibition as a whole—pose anthropological questions of translation and authorship: What can we learn about life on this planet through the objects we hold sacred, the languages in which we tell our stories, and the environments we inhabit? In reflecting on these elements, the work invites us to consider how we come to understand ourselves through what we choose to revere

Felipe Castelblanco solo exhibition in the Haus für Medien Kunst Oldenburg.

Felipe Castelblanco solo exhibition in the Haus für Haus für Medienkunst Oldenburg.

The Haus für Medienkunst Oldenburg presents a major solo exhibition by Felipe Castelblanco: Counter-Expeditions, title for the exhibition, features several new works as well as a retrospective of his ten-year interdisciplinary practice. On view are films, video installations, and photographs created in collaboration with communities in various regions—from the foothills of the Andes-Amazon to the North Atlantic. Rooted in a conceptually rich practice of site-specific research and artistic intervention, Counter-Expeditions proposes a radical rethinking of the colonial and epistemological legacy of the expedition.

While the traditional expedition is understood as an act of conquest, discovery, or exploitation, Castelblanco’s counter-expeditions open up a reciprocal form of movement that prioritizes encounter, engagement, and dialogue with people and places. These works invite us to cross the physical, mental, and political boundaries that separate knowledge systems and worldviews. In the counter-expeditions, the movement of the travelers through the terrain forms a continuum that brings one place into dialogue with the next. The counter-expeditions therefore do not aim to take possession of the memory, the place, or the novelty of the encounter. Nor do they attempt to claim parts of the landscape for themselves in order to justify their journey. Instead, the counter-explorers bring new energy to the eco-social fabric they encounter through offerings, reciprocity, celebration, contemplation, and collaboration with those who live in and care for the places that welcome them. Unlike the flâneur, the counter-expeditionist is exposed, and their own body endures, filters, absorbs, and even carries each place within them as a collection of experiences, mixtures, detours, and strange encounters with ever-changing biocultural landscapes.

Felipe Castelblanco in the Haus für Haus für Medienkunst Oldenburg.

Opening July 2nd.

Haus für Medienkunst Oldenburg

Katharinenstraße 23
D-26121 Oldenburg

Mario Asef & Kirstin Burckhardt @MOS, Gorzow

MOS, GORZOW, PRESENTS MOTHER-BURN

Opening: 6.06.2025, 18:00 Curator: Bartosz Nowak

MOS In Gorzow, Poland, presents “MOTHER-BURN”, the second video of a trilogy by the artist-couple Mario Asef & Kirstin Burckhardt. It was filmed on-site in the burned remains of a Redwood tree grove in the ecologically avantgarde architecture project “The Sea Ranch” in Northern California. Based on extensive periods of research there, Asef-Burckhardt created videos, drawings, paintings, performance, sound, photographs and poems produced on site and in Berlin. Their multimedia project is continuously expanding and shown in changing settings at exhibition venues in different countries.

Against the acute backdrop of the global environmental crisis, new anthropological questions such as ‘What must architecture connect today?’ and ‘What must love achieve today?’ are raised and artistically explored in close relation to the real topography of the The Sea Ranch. Situated in the north of San Francisco, The Sea Ranch is a 10 mile strip of land with clustered residential buildings which are integrated into the sharp cliffs of the Pacific. Strong, saltsoaked winds from the sea, rugged rocks in fine sand and ancient redwood forests characterise the landscape here. The masterplan for this territory was developed by the landscape architect Lawrence Halprin in collaboration with the four architects Richard Whitaker, Donlyn Lyndon, Charles Moore, and William Turnbull in the 1960s. To invigorate community building, Lawrence developed workshops together with his wife, the choreographer Anna Halprin. Since then, the estate has continued to grow and still sets international standards for the interplay between architecture and nature – in other words, ‘protection’ and ‘environment.

Martin Benson in talk Nika Fontaine

🎙️Martin Benson New Podcast Episode with Nika Fontaine.

In this episode, Martin Benson sits down with Nika Fontaine for an inspiring and thought-provoking conversation. Together, they delve into Nika’s personal history and her ongoing exploration of identity and spirituality. The discussion weaves through themes of alchemy, transformation, and the powerful role of art as a medium for self-discovery and ego dissolution.

A profound dialogue on creativity, inner change, and the spiritual dimensions of artistic expression.

Lauriston Avery Interview at Art Spiel

Lauriston Avery Interview

“My practice has always been there for me, and I find a necessary connection when I’m engaged with it”

Lauriston Avery

An interview with Lauriston Avery, one of the most charismatic and reflective artists we have worked with. After his incredible and successful solo show in New York, on the contemporary art gladiator circuit, at the Dutton Gallery, “The other ones”; this short interview with Riad Miah was published today, (03.04.25) in art spiel.

For all those interested in the dynamic development of the New York art scene, which has contributed so much to the history of art, I recommend Lauriston Avery Interview and the magazine. Read Here