Superheroines and Life
On Friday at 6.30 pm, the Chemnitz Art Collections will open two new exhibitions at Theaterplatz: ‘Allegories of Life: Ursula Mattheuer-Neustädt and Wolfgang Mattheuer’ and ‘Myth: From Gods to Superheroines’.
The Chemnitz Art Collections are dedicating a joint anniversary exhibition to the artists Ursula Mattheuer-Neustädt and Wolfgang Mattheuer, who would have celebrated their 100th birthdays in 2026 and 2027 respectively. ‘Allegories of Life’ brings together 200 paintings, drawings and prints over the course of the exhibition and explores the great questions of life – the individual, freedom and love – told through a shared story that began in 1946 at the Leipzig School of Applied Arts.
The project is a collaboration between the Chemnitz Art Collections, the Museum of Fine Arts in Leipzig and the Ludwiggalerie at Oberhausen Castle. ‘Allegories of Life’ examines the couple’s artworks together as dialogues for the first time. The focus is on how both artists used images as messages: Whilst Wolfgang Mattheuer increasingly drew on figures and motifs from ancient mythology from the 1970s onwards, Ursula Mattheuer-Neustädt found her inspiration primarily in literature and poetry. The pictorial motifs range from everyday situations to thematic themes and intellectual reflection. The works in the exhibition thus form part of a broader development in art in the GDR: from the 1970s onwards, artists increasingly drew on classical myths and literary material to formulate criticism and address social issues through the lens of heroic figures.
For Wolfgang Mattheuer, *The Flight of Sisyphus* (1972) marked the beginning of a series of works on various myths, such as Icarus, Prometheus and Sisyphus. Ursula Mattheuer-Neustädt translated her literary references into striking, mostly black-and-white drawings and prints of an almost symbolist nature. The exhibition ‘Allegories of Life’ will be on display from 3 October at the Kunstsammlungen am Theaterplatz. To mark both anniversaries, the graphic works on display will be replaced in January 2027, and further works on paper will be shown. The exhibition is sponsored by the Ostdeutsche Sparkassenstiftung and Sparkasse Chemnitz.
Exhibition on Myths
At the same time, the Kunstsammlungen am Theaterplatz are presenting the exhibition ‘Myth. From Gods to Superheroines’. It explores the significance of ancient myths from the early modern period to the present day and shows how their motifs continue to influence art, film, comics and digital media to this day.
The two exhibitions build on one another: taking Wolfgang Mattheuer’s artistic engagement with ancient myths as its starting point, the exhibition spans three centuries of art history and explores the relevance of mythological narratives in the present day. A particular focus of the exhibition is on art from the GDR era. The ‘Mythos’ exhibition will also be on display from 3 October.