Sonderausstellung | Die ganze Zeit

With works by Alma Ulrikke Bille Stræde, Anna Borgman, Ingo Gerken, Manaf Halbouni, Karin Lind, Carsten Nicolai, Sophia Pompéry, Ahmed Ramadan, Liza Sivakova, and Francis Zeischegg.


The exhibition venue, the Gründerzeit-era Britz Palace, provides the appropriate setting; its architectural shell and historicist furnishings become vehicles of meaning. The formal language of the prestigious building reflects the self-confidence of an emerging bourgeois class that increasingly understood and instrumentalized time as an economic resource. The clock tower on the Britzer Gutshof, for example, suggests that time management was also of greater importance in an industrially dominated agricultural sector.


The exhibition interweaves historical artifacts with contemporary artistic approaches to create a multifaceted narrative. It follows the thesis that control over time is synonymous with control over social resources – a realization that was systematized in the Gründerzeit period and is still effective today.


The power over time manifested itself on various levels: in the structuring of everyday life, in the organization of work, in the synchronization of entire societies and global trade. The whole period clearly demonstrates how the time culture established in the Gründerzeit period continues to have an impact today.


Current debates are taking place around working hours and care work, in the tension between accelerated globalization and deceleration, and in the question of sustainability in a networked world. The juxtaposition of historical evidence and artistic interventions creates a nuanced view of the temporality of the present – and thus also of possible futures.


The exhibition invites critical reflection on who exercises power over time today and what alternative temporal culture might be conceivable.


The exhibition is curated by Anna Borgman and Sophia Pompéry.