Allan Bestle
Traces
three monumental paintings
1st – 17th November
Allan Bestle is a Danish-born (1980) artist, living and working in Berlin since 2011.
Allan Bestle acts as an archeologist of the archetypical. His pictorial universe is filled with archetypes, signs and symbols. These “characters” appear during his shamanistic painting-rituals, mark after mark, layer after layer, filling the canvas with visually vivid experiences that are reminiscent of cave drawings, Viking and Indian petroglyphs or graffiti and become rhythmical gateways to our primordial and inner truer selves.
Jon Konkol
A Series of devastating Mistakes
4th – 13th October
Born and raised in Cincinnati, artist Jon Konkol started painting at an early age. He refined his work for a decade while exhibiting in New York City. He now lives in Berlin.
His off-brand, bizarre, non analytical paintings use quirky humour to draw from themes of depression, doubt, delusion, fear, shame, failed relationships, addiction, anxiety, trauma, isolation, desperation, bad habits, paranoia, confusion, communication disorders, lack of stability, greed, dependency, violent insecurity, the consequences of poor decisions and self-sabotage stemming from a toxic environment. In short, the paintings show us scenes of the victims and participants in a complex and hellish system, presented as a paranoid delusional fever dream that is too knowing to doubt, and too deranged to trust.
A Berlin Woman had the Idea…
The History of The Wiesenburg
7th & 8th September
curated by Heather Allen
A special exhibition for 2 Tage Wedding and Tag des offenen Denkmals 2019.
This repeat exhibition highlighted aspects of the rich history of this special place through its existence as a homeless shelter, 1st WW potato store for Berlin’s population and munitions production site for the 2nd WW. An architectural model of the planned development of the Wiesenburg by degewo was included in the exhibition.
We would like to thank degewo for supporting this exhibition. 
‘Wash!’
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A special performance drawing on the history of the Werkhalle Wiesenburg as the laundry of the former homeless shelter known locally as ‘Die Wiesenburg’. Every day of the year, 2,800 blankets and 2,800 towels were washed in this room.
Concept and organisation: Wilhelmine Horschig and Heather Allen
Washerwomen: Wilhelmine Horschig, Heather Allen, Heidrun Zebdji, Louise Berkholz, Heidi Munck, Bianca Kindler and Britta Lipka
Cello: Liron Yariv
Viola: Shasta Ellenbogen
Sound: Dennis Tuomi and Ole Ejnar Brolin
Video: Lisa Daesler, Heather Allen | Edit: Heather Allen
WOODSTOCK WEEKENDS
Art and Sound
8th July – 1st September
Inspired by the free spirit of Woodstock – an event that celebrated a new generation in music and art – the Werkhalle invited different artists to collaborate on visual and sound projects during each week of this exhibition. The results were on show to the public each Saturday and Sunday from 12 – 6pm.
The project included our ongoing collaboration with Wilder Garten and Luxus Fluxus Cabaret.
Wilder Garten is a group dedicated to the interdisciplinary, collaborative creation of art, music and performances.
Luxus Fluxus Cabaret is a flexible group of visual, sound, performance and word artists who work in the spirit of Dada.
Gero Fischer
Schlachtfelder
5th – 7th July 2019
Metropolis, 2019, 60 x 60 cm, oil on canvas
I was drinking in the kitchen when he burst in. My friend and roommate had been going through a tough year. He spewed an impassioned rant, colourful and articulate, complaining about having a lack of passion. I personally knew that this was an invalid complaint coming from someone who had never made artwork. I interrupted him and told him that if he made 100 paintings within 100 days I would give him 100 euro. He lit up. His face went from bewildered exhilaration to wild hopeless fear. I told him not to worry, I would take him to the painting store, show him the basics, and guide him along the way. The next day Gero Fischer the painter was born. He painted 15 hours a day. Within 3 months he had completed 130 something paintings, and they were good.
Jon Konkol, June 2019
Thomas bo Henriksson
Resonanzräume
3.05. – 30.06.2019
I am a painter, educated in the last modernist time when Cezanne / Picasso / Braque and not Duchamp, who came to represent the post-modern and conceptual in art, were the heroes and house-gods. When art was still connected with the magical and mysterious and masterpiece oil paintings were the Holy Grail. I have loved this world of struggles and debated individual thoughts since I was a boy. I believe in the necessity to reconnect to our inner selves and oil paint’s ability to do this.It is a belief in the power of the drawn line and colour – that colour chords convey experiences we all can sense and that these transmit a collective existential experience that enriches us all.
My most important modernist experience is the freedom and duty to invent and develop new true languages.
The paintings in Resonansräume are my latest attempts.
