Kategorie: Begleitprogramm

INVITATION TO THE GRAND FINISSAGE
of

TRANSHUMAN N°4
Nieves de la Fuente
Xenoform

curated by Stephan Klee

It is with regret that we note the year’s final solo exhibition is now rapidly drawing to a close. We would like to take this opportunity to thank all our interested visitors and, of course, first and foremost, the artist and the team.
However, we naturally wish to bring this exhibition to a fitting finale, and therefore cordially invite you to the Grand Finissage on Sunday, 4 October, from 11 am to 4 pm in the rooms of the Altes Rathaus, Göttingen. We are delighted to welcome the museum director, Ina Neddermeyer, and the artist, Nieves de la Fuente, as our guests on the day. Both will be actively involved in the programme for the closing event.
The programme begins at 11 am with a guided tour of the exhibition led by the curator and accompanied by the artist. Following a lunch break, a panel discussion between Nieves de la Fuente and Ina Neddermeyer on the artist’s work and aspects of the exhibition will take place at 2 pm, moderated by Stephan Klee. The event – and with it the exhibition – will draw to a close at 4 pm. We will be on site throughout from 11 am to 4 pm; please feel free to drop by at a time that suits you – admission is free.

Sunday 4 Oct 2026, 11 am–4 pm
The Grand Finissage
11 am
Guided Tour
‘Walk and Talk’ through the exhibition with the artist Nieves de la Fuente and the curator Stephan Klee in German and English
2 pm
Podium Dialogue
‘When the slag heap calls’ – Landscape, homeland and romanticism in interplanetary capitalism –
A moderated panel dialogue with Ina Neddermeyer (Director, Giersch Museum at Goethe University Frankfurt) and the artist Nieves de la Fuente, moderated by Stephan Klee
– Since the Bronze Age, mining has been radically altering the landscape of our planet. Where once primaeval forests and naturally formed rock formations shaped the landscape, artificially created topographies resulting from resource extraction have been spreading ever further for millennia, profoundly shaping not only the surface but also the subterranean nature of our Earth. This has far-reaching consequences for ecosystems, but at the same time it also alters our perception of the familiar landscape, our relationship with an artificial environment and the organisation of our society. But what happens when human production shifts into space – can we send our sense of home and our form of society straight to Mars?
(Free Admission)

Our Guests

Ina Neddermeyer is a curator and, since 2024, has been Director of the Museum Giersch at Goethe University (MGGU) in Frankfurt am Main. Prior to this, she was a curator and Head of the Art Department at the Zeppelin Museum in Friedrichshafen, as well as a collections curator at the Kunstpalais in Erlangen. In her curatorial work, she combines contemporary art with socio-political, ecological and scientific issues. Her exhibitions at the MGGU include ‘Fixing Futures. Planetary Futures between Speculation and Control’ (2025) and ‘Multispecies Members Club. New Alliances between Living and Artificial Systems’ (2026). She has also organised exhibitions such as ‘Kryptomania. The Promises of Blockchain’, ‘Beyond States. On the Limits of Statehood’ and ‘Into the Deep. Mines of the Future’.

Nieves de la Fuente was born in Madrid in 1988; she lives and works in Cologne and Madrid. After completing her Bachelor’s degree in Art at the Universidad Complutense de Madrid (2011) and studying at the Kunsthochschule Kassel (2011–2013), she completed a postgraduate degree in Media Arts at the Kunsthochschule für Medien in Cologne in 2016.
Working at the intersection of economically transformed spaces and multimedia installations in the gallery context, Nieves de la Fuente frequently employs virtual reality, browser experiences or augmented reality to immerse viewers of her works in historical events, surrealist scenarios or real locations of particular significance – such as the moon-like (or rather Mars-like) Rio Tinto open-cast mining area in southern Spain. Among other things, she works on ongoing series which – thanks to digital technology – explore the (re-)visualisation of impossible worlds and their fusion with real space. Her main focus lies on computer-assisted imaging and mapping, as well as on the relationship to visual perception – a relevant aspect at a time when computer-assisted imaging technologies are developing at a rapid pace.
Among other roles, she worked as an artistic-academic research assistant in the Art/Transmedia Space programme at the KHM Cologne (2018/2019) and at Burg Giebichenstein Halle (2019/2021). In addition to numerous international residencies, for example in Montepulciano, Montréal, Linz, Warehouse (online), Santander and Villa Aurora, Los Angeles, Nieves de la Fuente Gutiérrez has received numerous awards and grants, most recently the North Rhine-Westphalia Women Artists’ Prize 2022.

Stephan Klee is a curator who lives and works in Berlin and Göttingen. After five semesters studying philosophy and modern German history at Humboldt University, he studied at the Berlin University of the Arts, graduating in the summer of 2009 as a master’s student in fine arts.
Since its inception in 2006, his curatorial practice has primarily engaged with the phenomenology of ‘public space’. He is fundamentally interested in the interplay between a shared reality and the emergence of visual form. The subject matter ranges from interventions in socio-architectural space, through contemporary philosophical frameworks, to explorations of new media and an expanding virtuality. Since 2018, the foreseeable end of global ecology in the wake of a late-capitalist system has taken centre stage in his work. In this context, the possibilities of collective genesis often play a major role in his activities. Thus, through various collaborations with different partners, he realises diverse forms of independent, collective-cultural work. These partners have included, for example, Artitude e.V., Haus am Lützowplatz e.V., the Dockville Festival in Hamburg, the Institute for Spatial Experiments, the Goethe-Institut in Athens, State of Concept in Athens, REMAP in Athens, the Herzliya Museum in Tel Aviv, the Hamburger Bahnhof in Berlin, the Centre Pompidou in Paris, Kindred Spirit in Lisbon, amongst many others. Since 2024, he is also the Artistic Director of the Art Association Göttingen.

About the Exhibition
The Earth’s resources are finite and its ecological systems are already severely destabilised, as this summer’s global drought, amongst other things, has so starkly demonstrated. Consequently, technology moguls keen on progress have launched a new race for raw materials; only this time, the motto is not ‘Go West!’, but rather ‘Go Mars!’. Following on from the Earth’s resources, other celestial bodies are now set to be exploited in the near future.
The works in this solo exhibition, *Xenoform* by Nieves de la Fuente, explore relevant aspects of this theme. The five groups of works on display – ‘Bridge’, ‘No habrá servicio los Domingos ni en el cumpleaños de la Reina Victoria’, ‘Reliquia de las Disciplinas Geográficas’, ‘Night Companions’ and ‘ODD//FOES’ – explore aspects of the history and future of mining and interplanetary navigation, which is essential for the colonisation of space.
In doing so, the Spanish artist enriches the annual theme “TRANSHUMAN” in a multifaceted way with new areas and aspects drawn from her work. Nieves de la Fuente thus exemplifies where “transhuman tendencies” are already taking shape in the present and how this development fundamentally broadens the human perspective on interplanetary constellations and possibilities. However, new scope for action also requires social discourse to weigh up the potential consequences for the general public. The Kunstverein Göttingen facilitates this joint, critical discourse through its supporting programme and on the basis of its exhibitions of contemporary art, as an important part of its own social agenda.

REMAINING PROGRAMME

Sun 27 Sep 3 pm
Sunday Tour
with Stephan Klee

Sunday 4 Oct 2026, 11 am–4 pm
The Grand Finissage
11 am
Guided Tour
‘Walk and Talk’ through the exhibition with the artist Nieves de la Fuente and the curator Stephan Klee in German and English
2 pm
Podium Dialogue
with Ina Neddermeyer (Director of the Giersch Museum at Goethe University Frankfurt) and the artist Nieves de la Fuente, moderated by Stephan Klee
(Free admission)

Duration
9 Aug – 4 Oct 2026
Tue – Sun 11 am – 5 pm

Location
Altes Rathaus Göttingen (1. OG)
Markt 9
37073 Göttingen

Admission fee:
€ 3,00 / € 1,50 (reduced)
Free admission for guests aged 18 and under
Free admission with a Kultur Ticket
Free admission to exhibition Vernissages and Finissages

Event images:
Nieves de la Fuente ODD // FOES – Series, 2023, computer-generated image, courtesy of the artist, @ VG Bild-Kunst Bonn, 2026stlerin

THE ANNUAL PROGRAMME

TRANSHUMAN (2026)
>POSTHUMAN (2027)

The Kunstverein Göttingen continues to follow the proven two-year biennial programme rhythm in order to enable the most in-depth examination possible of the programme’s overarching themes. After TERRA DIASPORA (2024–2025) explored contemporary phenomena, our current programme looks to the near and distant future.
The two-year programme TRANSHUMAN >POSTHUMAN (2026 > 2027) takes a critical look at the global transformation anticipated by some schools of thought: the transition from the anthropocentric humans of our time to the technically optimised transhumans of the near future and, even further into the future of our species, to posthumans. In short: the development of humanity from modern humanism to transhumanism to posthumanism.

The basic theme for the first year is TRANSHUMAN (2026) and includes four solo exhibitions and one group exhibition, bringing together artistic approaches and works to form a collection of perspectives and aspects of transhumanism. The formal and thematic basis of all exhibitions is the artistic exploration of the acceleration of technological development and capitalist growth, and the desired biotechnological optimisation of the human body and mind. The resulting social upheavals are already taking place in many ways in our present, with drastic consequences for coexistence within the span of a generation. These acute experiences flow into the visions of the approaching future and into the collective critical reflection of both the artists and our audience. With this in mind, a wide-ranging discourse and education programme is offered. We also aim to publish the annual programme again. The ideology of transhumanism should not be propagated uncritically, but rather deconstructed as critically as possible, collectively and on the basis of the works on display. We cordially invite all interested parties to join us.

We would like to thank our sponsors: Hochschule Bielefeld, Niedersächsisches Ministerium für Wissenschaft und Kultur, Stadt Göttingen, Sparkasse Göttingen And Landschaftsverband Südniedersachsen e.V.