Phoenix vs Babel

The exhibition acknowledges the cultural diversity of the German capital and the exceptional phenomenon that has turned Berlin into a new Babel of sorts, where artists from all over the world have converged to create an environment rarely seen in history.

According to the myth of Babel, the builders of the famous tower were punished for attempting to reach for God’s position but also, and more importantly, for trying to create the conditions of an earthly harmony. By contrast, “Phoenix vs Babel” revisits the myth by questioning the conditions of possibility for such understanding. The myth of the phoenix is almost universal, present as it is in a majority of cultures and human traditions. Besides its many other symbolic aspects, it represents the unfailing dimension of human creation and inventiveness.

In this case, the phoenix serves as a counterpoint to a destructive Babel and its tragic consequences for the development of humankind. The focus will be on its symbolic dimension of rebirth and endurance – of strong cultural elements, to be specific.

Beyond these mythical and symbolic considerations, Phoenix vs Babel aims to encourage the emergence of “soft” strategies in resistance to a standardized production while paying attention to the paths followed by signs and individual creations in their mutations and their various historical manifestations.

The exhibition also ambitions to show how foreign artists living in a cosmopolitan metropolis such as Berlin do not lose any of their culture of origin, learning how to absorb it in order to recreate it, imbuing it with new meaning in the process. By focusing on locating and emphasizing the persistence of strong cultural signs, capable of traveling through history and geography and defying artistic fads, Phoenix vs Babel also means to examine how the practices of contemporary art – with its ability to mix periods and genres as well as isolate moments – produce singularity without necessarily creating confusion or chaos.