After an extensive renovation phase, Villa Stuck will shine in new splendor from October 18, 2025. Façades, architectural sculptures and the extended artists' garden will welcome visitors in an ambience that is as historic as it is modern. The historic rooms will be presented with fresh hangings, new works and updated furnishings. The reopening is dedicated to two outstanding exhibitions that impressively expand the spectrum of contemporary art in Munich: the radically collaborative work of Chicks on Speed and the luminous paintings of British artist Louise Giovanelli. Both exhibitions shed light on the polyphony, performative power and social relevance of art - and open up a dialog between past, present and future.
Chicks on Speed: Utopia, Photo: Wolf-Dieter Grabner
Chicks on Speed: Utopia
Since 1995, Alex Murray-Leslie and Melissa E. Logan have been combining art, performance, music, fashion and activism to create a disruptive Gesamtkunstwerk. Founded at the Munich Academy, the collective has developed projects over three decades that draw on influences from Dada, Fluxus, Situationism and queer feminism. The exhibition Utopia takes visitors on a journey through almost 30 years of collaborative work: from legendary club projects such as the "Seppi Bar" to sound collages, films, sculptures and textile designs to educational workshops. The show will be accompanied by the release of the new album HEAR&NOWTopia and the box set HEARtopia. Curators and members of the collective - including Kathi Glas, Tina Frank, Leslie Johnson, Anat Ben-David and Alex Murray-Leslie - provide an intimate insight into a body of work that understands art as a social practice, questions conventions and always remains radically experimental. Utopia shows how Chicks on Speed combines technology, media and performance to comment on social structures in a humorous, subversive and visionary way.
October 18, 2025 to March 1, 2026
Louise Giovanelli, Scala, 2024, Oil on linen © DACS 2025. photo © White Cube (David Westwood)
Louise Giovanelli: A Song of Ascents
The British painter Louise Giovanelli (1993) stages moments between expectation, stage and collective experience in large-format oil paintings. Her luminous, detailed works focus on rituals, social contexts and the alternation between glamor and abysmal. Inspired by photographs, film stills and iconic art history, Giovanelli's paintings merge fabrics, light and texture into theatrical scenes in which collective happiness transcends the isolation of the individual. In addition to new works, the exhibition also shows a selection of earlier works that trace her development as a central figure in young British painting. With the founding of the Apollo Painting School in Manchester, she is also committed to the next generation of female artists. A Song of Ascents opens up an awareness of the performative power of painting, which oscillates between reality and illusion, ecstasy and contemplation.
October 18, 2025 to March 1, 2026
www.villastuck.de
