MASCHINENHAUS M0

Lecture Go East! by Thibaut de Ruyter
in conjunction with the exhibition Defying Gravity by Taiyo Onorato & Nico Krebs
1 July 2018

Due to the geographical location of Berlin, it makes sense to turn our gaze further east. Yet the deeper we penetrate into the eastern realm, the more diffuse our ideas about the countries and regions beyond the borders of Europe become. In the series of photographs Continental Drift, which was created between 2013 and 2016 on the way to Mongolia, Taiyo Onorato & Nico Krebs present individual impressions of places that are generally unfamiliar to us in Western Europe.

In recent years, curatorial projects have taken Thibaut de Ruyter from the Caucasus to Vladivostok by way of Central Asia. Based on this experience, in his lecture “Go East!” he will discuss everyday life and the contemporary art scene in the region. De Ruyter is interested in questions such as: What does it mean to be an artist in countries like Uzbekistan or Kazakhstan? What is the relationship between figurative and abstract art in Central Asia? To what extent is political art possible under a dictatorship?

Thibaut de Ruyter (b. 1972 in Lille, France) is an architect, curator, and art and architecture critic. He has lived and worked in Berlin since 2001. He regularly publishes articles in magazines such as Art Press, Il Giornale dell’Architettura, and Frieze. Since 2007 he has been a member of the French section of the International Association of Art Critics (AICA). Most recently, along with Inke Arns, de Ruyter curated the traveling exhibition Die Grenze / The Border for the Goethe-Institut, which was shown in Moscow, St. Petersburg, and Dortmund, among other stops.