Mischa Kuball's Light Installations Confront Goethe, Newton, and Galileo at Casa di Goethe

At Casa di Goethe in Rome, German conceptual artist Mischa Kuball (b. 1959, Düsseldorf) presents two light installations from April 30 to October 4, 2026. Curated by director Gregor H. Lersch, the exhibition juxtaposes Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's and Isaac Newton's opposing theories on color and light refraction in 'Newton/Goethe luce nera', a projection on a rotating body where color emerges as a process dependent on light source, space, time, and perspective. The second installation, 'five suns / after Galileo', visualizes Galileo Galilei's 1610 observations of sunspots through light projections on five rotating colored glass discs, underscoring Galileo's evidence for a heliocentric model and his conflict with the Catholic Church. Kuball, known for site-specific interventions exploring light, space, and social perception, often references scientific questions including neuroscience and Aby Warburg's art theory.