Anna & Bernhard Blume at the Villa Schöningen, Potsdam, Germany
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“Among Trees” brings together around 90 works from by more than 60 international artists spanning three centuries including Im Wald (In the Forest) series by Anna & Bernhard Blume. Rather than treating the forest as a fixed motif, the exhibition approaches it as a shared terrain—observed, recorded, and continually reimagined by each generation. Historical and contemporary positions enter into a dialogue about nature, landscape, and our changing relationship with them.
The large-format photo sequence shows works from the series Im Wald (In the Forest), which was created between 1982 and 1991 and which until now has only rarely been shown as a complete sequence. Im Wald is considered one of the couple’s central works and it occupies a special position in their oeuvre, as it was the first and only time that the artists moved the locus to an outside setting. Thematically, the sequence is closely linked to several of their other photo sequences, as it also focuses on the ironic depiction of habits and rituals.
The artist couple Anna and Bernhard Blume (1936-2020 and 1937-2011, respectively) began creating their performative black-and-white photographs in the 1980s, working together in front of and behind the camera. The Blumes, however, turned this orderliness completely on its head. Everyday objects slip out of their grasp and take on a life of their own: potatoes fly through the air, broken plates are strewn over the kitchen floor, furniture collapses, and people with contorted faces futilely try to gain control of the situation.
Curated by Victor Auberjonois and presented in cooperation with PASSAGE, the exhibition unfolds throughout Villa Schöningen and its historic parkland in Potsdam as an encounter between art, nature, and space. Here, landscape is not so much depicted as opened up—as a repository of time, memory, and transformation.
Villa Schöningen
Berliner Straße 86
14467 Potsdam