For their first solo museum exhibition in Germany, Slavs and Tatars turn to the enigmatic writer and philosopher Johann Georg Hamann, the enfant terrible of the Anti-Enlightenment, whom Goethe called the greatest mind of his time and Kierkegaard considered ‘the greatest humorist in history’. A Königsberg native who died in Münster, Hamann is ripe for resuscitation: attacking the Enlightenment is separation of mind and body, thought and action with an unlikely combination of highly sexualized language and Lutheran theology. The artists revisit Hamann across an expansive scenography, including a pickle bar, a new publication, and an audio work at the Westfälischer Kunstverein in Münster. In the current crisis of modernity, the exhibition “Saalbadereien / Bathhouse Quackeries" places language and performativity at centre stage as a means to better understand the limits of reason and what it means to go sour on power.
On the occasion of their exhibition at the Westfälischer Kunstverein, Slavs and Tatars present Kirchgängerbanger : a new, bi-lingual (Eng/DE) reader on Johan Georg Hamann, the 18th century polemicist, frenemy of Kant, and proto-Postmodernist who critiqued the Enlightenment with an unlikely mix of Lutheran theology and vulgar sexuality, enough to make even Bataille blush: "My coarse imagination has never been able to conceive of the creative spirit without genitalia.” With an introduction by Slavs and Tatars and a selection of Hamann essays including the triple-platinum hits "New apology of the Letter H" and "New Apology of the Letter H by Itself." The reader is co-published by Motto Books.

Opening reception: Friday, 2 February at 7pm
(admission free)

mpefm GERMANY art press release