Nationalgalerie and BMW announce shortlist of the Preis der Nationalgalerie 2021. Lamin Fofana, Calla Henkel & Max Pitegoff, Sandra Mujinga and Sung Tieu nominated.

Munich/Berlin. A first jury nominates the artists Lamin Fofana, Calla Henkel & Max Pitegoff, Sandra Mujinga and Sung Tieu for the Preis der Nationalgalerie 2021. The nominees will show their artworks in a joint exhibition at Hamburger Bahnhof – Museum für Gegenwart – Berlin from September 16, 2021 to February 27, 2022. In cooperation with BMW as long-term partner the Preis der Nationalgalerie will be awarded for the eleventh time this fall by the Nationalgalerie Berlin.

The international jury, consisting of Adam Budak (Artistic Director, Kestner Gesellschaft, Hannover), Dr Andrea Lissoni (Artistic Director, Haus der Kunst, Munich), Dr Zoé Whitley (Director, Chisenhale Gallery, London), and Franciska Zólyom (Director, Curator, Galerie für Zeitgenössische Kunst Leipzig), noted about their unanimous selection:

“Lamin Fofana’s (lives in Berlin) experience of moving between Africa, North America, and Europe is palpable in his experimental approach to creating sonic environments. Crucial in the context of this production is an engagement with historical forms of Black activism and critical thought, including the writing of Amiri Baraka, W. E. B. Du Bois, and Sylvia Wynter. Yet his work expands beyond the act of translation to create a space for shared experience and heightened awareness. In doing so, he proposes an active and open practice of listening, a skill which represents an essential precondition for coexistence.

Over the course of the past ten years, the work of Calla Henkel and Max Pitegoff (born 1988 in Minneapolis, USA/born 1987 in Buffalo, USA; both live in Berlin) has been both a documentation of and a catalyst for socio-urban changes within the context of Berlin and beyond. Against this backdrop, their practice, which has developed out of the tradition of documentary photography to encompass the nurturing of their own creative community, feels timely. Emerging from lived experience, their works pose crucial questions about what is to be shown and what is to be safeguarded, allowing a multitude of narratives to unfold around a shared setting.

Operating with a freshness and energy, Sandra Mujinga (born 1989 in Goma, DR Congo, lives in Berlin and Oslo, Norway) finds images and spatial arrangements for transient worlds, which extend beyond an anthropocentric paradigm. Her engagement with a notion of place, both as exhibition space and as a wider social category, offers a commentary on settings and locations, particularly those that consider themselves liberal. By not only navigating a condition of inbetweenness, but also by reconfiguring it and sharing it with others in a variety of media, she questions established principles of presence and sculpture.

By using a variety of artistic media including installation, sound, text, video and public interventions, Sung Tieu (born 1987 in Hai Duong, Vietnam, lives in Berlin) creates formally minimalistic and impressive environments that trigger immediate sensual and somatic experience. Starting out from an interest in psychoacoustics, her works depict how sound can be used as an invasive tool in order to manipulate individual and collective behavior, beliefs, and desires. Informed by the conflicting mechanisms of care and control, and the unstable spatial and social relations that impact on life in diaspora, she investigates the diffusion of information and the movement of people, goods, and commodities in a compelling manner.”

Dr Gabriele Knapstein, Head of the Hamburger Bahnhof – Museum für Gegenwart – Berlin: “The Preis der Nationalgalerie has been awarded since 2000, and we are delighted that we can continue, in cooperation with the Freunde der Nationalgalerie and our partner BMW, to present the work of outstanding young artists to a wide audience. We would like to thank the members of the first jury for their enthusiastic discussions and an exciting decision. Once more, it is apparent just how international the contemporary art scene in Germany is.”

“During times of rapid change, responsibility and reliability are of the greatest value. As is culture. In 2021 we celebrate 50 years of our worldwide cultural engagement and we are proud to have been a partner of the Preis der Nationalgalerie for fifteen years now. This year this prestigious award gives a stage to exciting young positions of contemporary art who celebrate crossover and collaboration,” says Dr Nicolas Peter, Member of the Board of Management of BMW AG, Finance.

Together with a video statement the shortlist was first published exclusively by ArtReview and Monopol.

A second jury will choose the awardee of the Preis der Nationalgalerie on October 7, 2021 with a price ceremony at the same evening. The award consists of a solo exhibition accompanied by a catalogue at one of the institutions of Berlin’s Nationalgalerie in fall 2022.

The Preis der Nationalgalerie is enabled by the Freunde der Nationalgalerie e.V. since 2000 with BMW as exclusive partner for 15 years. The award focuses on young important positions of today. Artists of all nationalities are eligible if they are currently working in Germany and are less than 40 years old. Previous awardees amongst others were Monica Bonvicini (2005), Cyprien Gaillard (2011), Anne Imhof (2015), Agnieszka Polska (2017) and Pauline Curnier Jardin (2019).

For further information, please refer to http://preisdernationalgalerie.de/en/
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