Gallery above

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The Galerie Oben is an art gallery founded in Chemnitz in 1973 . The gallery still represents artists from the Clara Mosch group .

history

At the beginning of the 1970s, the GDR's cultural landscape began to revive. In 1971, Erich Honecker proclaimed the cultural "breadth and diversity" at the 8th  party congress of the SED . In 1972/73 the VII  art exhibition took place in Dresden, the exhibition had 655,000 visitors within six months, and a sales stand for art was set up for the first time. A boom in gallery foundings began. The gallery above was founded in 1973. It emerged from a sales cooperative of visual artists in the Karl-Marx-Stadt district established in 1954 . In addition to the exhibition program, regular “Wednesday talks” took place. On these weekdays, actors ( Eberhard Esche 1975, Ulrich Mühe 1978), musicians ( Uschi Brüning 1975) and writers ( Eva Strittmatter 1977, Erich Arendt 1981) were invited to the gallery. The centrally located gallery rooms in downtown Chemnitz were considered a place of resistance to expression of opinion. The art auctions in 1977 and 1987 were the reason for the attempt by the SED district management to transfer the Galerie Oben into the "state art trade of the GDR". The gallery above resisted nationalization. However, it remained under official surveillance until the end of the GDR in 1989.

In 1974, the establishment of the state art trade began with initially 3 affiliated galleries for contemporary art. In 1989 there were 40 galleries. In 1974 the first art exhibition took place in the "EP Gallery" ("only private") in the apartment of the psychologist and sociologist Jürgen Schweinbraden on Prenzlauer Berg in Berlin. This first exhibition was a homage to Picasso and marked the beginning of a series of exhibitions of national and international art, including 30 exhibitions by painters and graphic artists from the GDR as well as performances and video installations. Schweinbraden was sentenced in 1980 to a fine of 3,000 marks or 3 years in prison, he moved to the Federal Republic. The head of the East Berlin “Arkade”, Klaus Werner , made it possible for Michael Morgner to have the first solo exhibition in 1976 and thus achieved a high level of attention for Morgner's artistic work at the Permanent Mission of the Federal Republic of Germany . The state art trade prevented Morgner from participating in foreign exhibitions until the 1980s. In 1977 six GDR artists took part in documenta 6 in Kassel; Georg Baselitz , Gerhard Richter and Markus Lüpertz withdrew their pictures from the exhibition in protest. In 1977 the Chemnitz gallery and artist group Clara Mosch was founded as the country's first producer gallery . This group consisted of the artists Dagmar Ranft-Schinke , Thomas Ranft , Gregor-Thorsten Schade , Michael Morgner and Carlfriedrich Claus , these artists, who worked avant-garde in GDR times, often exhibited in the Oben gallery.

The publication "Painting and Graphics in the GDR" by Lothar Lang was published in 1978 by Edition Leipzig and the JC Bucher publishing house in Lucerne, the works of the painters Max Uhlig and Eberhard Göschel , represented by the Galerie Oben, were given detailed explanations.

The Galerie Oben is now in cooperation with the TU Chemnitz and supports young artists who are about to complete their studies. Every year there is a themed exhibition with the title "University graduates exhibit". In addition, the gallery works with partners from business, science and education.

Artistic Director

  • since 1973 board member (alternating composition of painters, sculptors, graphic artists) and secretary Georg Brühl
  • from 1979 Gunar Barthel
  • from 1987 Bernd Weise
  • from 1989/90 Tobias Tetzner
  • from 2005 producer gallery of the artists
  • from 2006 Kathrin Lahl

Exhibited artists (selection)

Web links