World and System – Contemporary Art between Analysis, Search for Understanding and Dilemma

With his "World" and "System Pictures", the artist A.R. Penck created one of his most important groups of works to date in Dresden in the 1960s. The exhibition "World and System" takes Penck's idea of an artistic description of complex systems as the starting point for a look at contemporary art. In the face of increasingly dense political, economic and media interdependencies and networks, reflections on structures and system relationships take the place of direct explanations of the world. Artistic explorations of questions concerning the understanding of complex systemic relationships thus appear more topical than ever. World and System is intended to relate A.R. Penck's questions to current themes as well as to the strategies and perspectives of other German and international artists. Paintings, drawings, photographs and objects by A.R. Penck, Öyvind Fahlström, Charles and Ray Eames, Franz Ackermann, Theo Boettger, Mark Dion, Benjamin Edwards, Andreas Gursky, Olaf Holzapfel, Mark Lombardi and Frank Nitsche are on display.
Film presentations with works by Chris Marker, Lutz Dammbeck and Johan Grimonprez complement the exhibition.