ifa-Galerie Berlin Talk Examines GDR Participation in documenta 6

Key facts

• The talk takes place at ifa-Galerie Berlin and is organized with historians Dr. Alexia Pooth and Dr. Swantje Greve.
• It focuses on the GDR's participation in documenta 6 in 1977, the only instance where East German artists were represented at the Kassel exhibition.
• Artists shown included Willi Sitte, Bernhard Heisig, Werner Tübke, Wolfgang Mattheuer, Jo Jastram, and Fritz Cremer.
• Georg Baselitz and Markus Lüpertz withdrew their works in protest against exhibiting alongside East German artists.
• "The Disobedient Painters," a group of formerly persecuted East German artists, denounced the suppression of free art in the GDR through leaflets and a demonstration.
• The discussion examines the cultural-political conditions that enabled the participation and the intertwining of art, diplomacy, and ideology during the Cold War.
• Dr. Alexia Pooth's book Exhibition Politics: documenta and the GDR (Kerber Verlag, 2024) serves as the starting point.
• Dr. Swantje Greve earned her doctorate at Humboldt University of Berlin and has worked at the Topography of Terror Foundation and the German Historical Museum.