Katrin Mayer

Katrin Mayer’s approach is a type of archaeology of knowledge. She takes up gender-political and subcultural histories of place and – having checked their validity – translates them into a spatial-material formulation. In doing so, she works against the fiction of an allegedly neutral space, revealing ways in which the place is constantly intertwined with historical meanings. She reassembles selected traces from her research so as to suggest specific shifts in the way we interpret them. The results are temporary, hybrid settings, whose materiality and manner of display become meaningful signifiers, often exceeding their function as mere intermediaries. For Mayer, textiles serve as methodical testimonies, in which the concept of pattern is inextricably linked to the concept of structure and must always be formed in order to become legible. 

Mayer has created works for the following institutions, among others: Kunstverein für die Rheinlande und Westfalen, Düsseldorf (2017), PIK (Projektraum im Kunstwerk) Cologne (2018), Kunstverein Hamburg (2017), Kunsthalle Lingen (2016), Ludlow38 MINI/Goethe-Institut New York (2014), Kunsthalle Bielefeld (2014), Kunstmuseum Stuttgart (2013), Museum Abteiberg Mönchengladbach (2013), and KUB Arena Kunsthaus Bregenz (2011).

She lives in Düsseldorf and Berlin.