A change of guard at the art collections
The starting point for the new exhibition is the painting ‘Shift Change. Young Miners’ (1956) by Karl Heinz Jakob, in which the handover in the shaft takes place with a handshake. The Zwickau-based painter and draughtsman is the grandfather of the artist Henrike Naumann, whose installation ‘DDR Noir (Miners’ Pub)’ (2018) is presented in dialogue with it. Works by Karl Heinz Jakob and Henrike Naumann are presented together in the exhibition, thereby addressing the artist’s question of how society engages with art from the GDR.
The discourse is initiated by Henrike Naumann’s ongoing artistic engagement with her grandfather’s mural ‘The Mechanisation of Agriculture’. The mural was created in 1960 for the City Council as part of the ‘Parteifalte’ project. Since 2002, it has been concealed behind a plasterboard wall. The artist’s works in the German Pavilion at the 61st Venice Biennale stand in direct relation to the hidden mural in Chemnitz. The pavilion was opened posthumously in the spring of 2026 and will be the venue for the presentation of the Henrike Naumann Prize for Fine Art in November 2026.
The exhibition at the Kunstsammlungen am Theaterplatz showcases paintings, drawings and installations that foster a dialogue between the generations and pays tribute to the work of both artists. The exhibition runs until 31 January 2027.