Before the Fall of the Wall

The exhibition Before the Fall of the Wall presents a number of leading artists who resumed painting in the eventful decade leading up to the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989.

This year marks the 30th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the existing world order. The dramatic days of November 1989 signalled the end of a world where two opposing ideologies had been on a collision course for almost half a century, enveloping the world in permanent fear of devastating nuclear war.

Although the lines were quite literally drawn between East and West, between communism and planned economy on the one hand and democracy and capitalism on the other, the West in the 80s was characterised by a number of inherent contradictions. The era offered plenty of pop and glitter. Music channel MTV was born and had its heyday, and the music video catapulted the pop star to new heights. Hollywood was nostalgic for the 1950s, when American consumer culture was rolled out globally in earnest, just as it got another boost under Ronald Reagan's neo-liberalism.

In sharp contrast to consumerism and the rise of popular culture, the period also saw the rise of the punk movement, anarchists, slum stormers and a strong left-wing, all of whom, despite major internal differences, stood in opposition to the ruling capitalism.

In this morass of opposing ideological viewpoints, the artists added another. They were wary of joining the current currents and reacted almost apathetically to the inflamed political environment.

Instead, they celebrated creativity and drew inspiration from the great masters of art history while, with a certain irony, also tapping into the new flow of images from mass media and popular culture. The artists of the 80s revived painting, which had fallen by the wayside in the 70s, and cultivated the notion of the death of great narratives and art without message. As you can see in the exhibition "Before the Fall of the Wall", the revitalised painting exploded in a wild samsurium of colour, graffiti and expressionism with a sea of references pointing in all directions.

The exhibition consists of works from ARoS' art collection and features leading Danish artists such as Claus Carstensen, Inge Ellegaard and Erik A. Frandsen as well as works by a number of foreign artists.