Finissage & Artist Talk 

with Christian Jankowski and Susan Philipsz (in English)

Susan Philipsz and Christian Jankowski are among the most remarkable artists working today. Philipsz explores the emotional and psychological effects of sound on the reception of spaces. At the end of 2015 she will travel to California as fellow of Villa Aurora to study the intelligence activities of the FBI in the context of exile experiences of Hanns Eisler, which will result in a video and sound installation. Jankowski’s work is best known for ironically and humorously confronting the supposed certainties and mechanisms of mass- media society. His work 16mm Mystery, created during his stay at the Villa Aurora and shown at “Checkpoint California,” evokes 9/11 via the staging of collapsing skyscraper in downtown Los Angeles. In this talk the two artists illuminate their working methods from a California perspective.

Christian Jankowski (born in Göttingen, 1968) is a visual artist living and working in Berlin. He studied at the Hochschule für Bildende Künste in Hamburg and since 2005 has been a professor of sculpture (installation, performance, and video) at the Akademie der Bildenden Künste in Stuttgart. He has had solo exhibitions at a number of international museums, including the Museum für Gegenwartskunst, Basel (2003), Museo d'Arte Contemporanea, Rome (2003), Miami Art Museum (2007), and Berlinische Galerie (2011). In addition to group exhibitions at PS1, Jankowski was included in shows at the Neue Nationalgalerie Berlin (2007), the Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo (2011), and K20 Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen, Düsseldorf (2011). In 2013 he was awarded the Videonale-Preis der Kfw-Stiftung. In 2016 Jankowski will be the curator of the European Biennial of Contemporary Art, Manifesta, in Zurich.

Susan Philipsz (born in Glasgow, 1965) is a visual artist living and working in Berlin. She received her bachelor of fine arts degree from the Jordanstone College of Art, Dundee (1989-93) and a master’s degree at the University of Ulster, Belfast (1993-94). In 2000, she received a scholarship to the PS1 residency program, and in 2001 she was a fellow at KunstWerke in Berlin. In 2010 Philipsz was awarded the esteemed Turner Prize, and in 2014 the Order of the British Empire. Most recently her work was exhibited at K21 Ständehaus, Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen, Düsseldorf (2013), Eastside Projects, Birmingham (2014), at various locations in Denmark, Sweden, and Norway (2014), Governors Island, New York, (2014), and at the Hamburger Bahnhof, in Berlin (2014).