In the venerable Villa Dessauer, once the home of the Jewish hop merchant Carl Emanuel Dessauer and today one of the central addresses for modern art in Bamberg, the Kunstverein Bamberg e. V. is presenting an extraordinary survey exhibition by Berlin artist Heike Baranowsky. From December 6, 2025 to January 11, 2026, works from three decades of her career will be on display here - works that oscillate between documentary precision and poetic abstraction and draw visitors deep into the phenomena of time, space and perception.
Heike Baranowsky is one of the most prominent artists of her generation. Her works have been shown at international institutions such as the MoMA in New York, the Serpentine Gallery London, the Hamburger Bahnhof in Berlin and the Lentos Museum Linz. She has been Professor of Fine Arts at the Academy of Fine Arts in Nuremberg since 2020.
At the center of the Bamberg exhibition is the work "Soliloquio" (2023) - a fascinating stop-motion animation that documents the movement of sunlight in the Roman church of Santa Maria degli Angeli over the course of an entire year. Created during the pandemic, the work reflects the relationship between stillness and change, between inner contemplation and cosmic time. Baranowsky succeeds in making it possible to experience light as both a measurable quantity and a metaphysical experience.
Other works such as "Mondfahrt 2001" or "Death/breath tomb/womb evil/live" (1998) testify to her consistent interest in the interface between observation of nature, perception and technical transformation. Her videos, sculptures and cyanotypes are never mere depictions of reality, but subtle constructions of movement and transience. Through subtle shifts in perspective, rhythm and duration, invisible processes become visible - the movement of the sun, the circulation of the air, the almost imperceptible movement of a shadow.
Stadtgalerie Bamberg - Villa Dessauer © Museen der Stadt Bamberg
The exhibition blends harmoniously into the impressive ambience of Villa Dessauer, whose stately rooms have been a stage for contemporary art since 1987. Historical architecture and modern aesthetics meet here - an exciting dialog that gives Baranowsky's work an additional resonance.
This show not only honors an outstanding position in contemporary video art, but also once again confirms the Villa Dessauer as a lively place of artistic exchange - a house that combines tradition and the present, regionality and internationality in an inspiring way.
December 6, 2025 to January 18, 2026
www.museum.bamberg.de
