"Now, when heaven and earth and winds are at rest": It sounds so poetic, enchanted, transfigured. A counter-image to the restless times we live in today? The title of this exhibition comes from the Renaissance period, a poem by Francesco Petrarca from the 14th century. In the Baroque era, in 1638, the composer Claudio Monteverdi set this poem to music. The place and time where heaven and earth and winds rest for a moment were already surrounded by unrest, struggle, and war back then.
Is looking inward the only thing that can bring us peace – then as now? Should we more often seek connection with ourselves? So that we can better process the unsettling information that constantly comes our way? Should we turn more toward nature and love? And see our vulnerability as a strength rather than a weakness?
Poetry and music in an art exhibition: The exhibition builds upon these two "old" works by Petrarca and Monteverdi. With selected works from contemporary art, we attempt to discover more about this feeling of "calm in the storm." A feeling that is apparently not new. The artworks condense entire lives into images, they create art from biographies. They show how a sense of strength for the future can emerge from experiences and memories of weakness. In these restless times, they gift us a few moments of calm, of reflection, of introspection.
