Part 6: Colonotopia

Exhibition Opening
Volume III, Part 6: Colonotopia
25.04.2025, 19:00

We welcome you to the exhibition opening of the sixth chapter of The Last Terminal, Volume III, titled Colonotopia, concluding two parallel long-term solo exhibitions.

The progressive restaging of Was machen Sie um zwei? Ich schlafe. a solo exhibition by gerlach en koop, and Paintings, a six part revelation of paintings by Lisa Ivory.

Colonotopia is a marriage between colonoscopy and utopia. A medically intrusive procedure and a philosophical wreck. Dissecting it further, it's a cross fertilization of several key operative concepts: that of colonial histories, scopic regimes and ruins.

Om acht uur?
Dan word ik wakker.
(2024—)
gerlach en koop exhibit works by Steve Van den Bosch, Annaïk Lou Pitteloud, Shimabuku, Ismaïl Bahri, Gabriel Kuri, Hendl H Mirra, Mark Geffriaud, Ian Kiaer and Jacqueline Mesmaeker

As soon as the grip of darkness slackens, the boundaries between you and the objects around you lose their fluidity. Gradually they start to distinguish themselves, moving away from you, from the walls, from the floor, the ceiling. And you are moving away from them. Mutual sympathy turns into differentiation: the headphones on the couch with the cord in an elegant curl on the floor; the scissors on the desk, not closed but in the shape of an x; the chair that has not been drawn up; the black-and-white postcard stuck on the wall with Blu Tack; the glass of water without water on the small metal table mobiltecnica torino next to the bed; the shoes side by side close to the leg of the table.
You’re washed ashore. You leave behind a stagnant surf of crumpled bed sheets as your feet touch the floor. You open the bedroom door. No longer asleep, but awake? Not quite.

Was machen Sie um zwei? Ich Schlafe. was an exhibition at the GAK, Gesellschaft für Aktuelle Kunst in Bremen in 2020. Four years later, in Rib, gerlach en koop accepted Maziar Afrassiabi’s invitation to restage—over time—their attempt to approach the elusive phenomenon that is sleep by displaying works by other artists. Works that either corresponded to the disintegration of falling asleep or the reintegration of waking up.
During the night of 8th March Rib was exceptionally open until the next morning. Not an event, not nothing, an exhibit. After this good night’s wake, dawn has finally broken the surface. The last stage in the restaging has arrived. All works on display are associated in different ways to the sometimes strange, sometimes frightful, experience of waking up. Frightful? Sure, we’ve all done it many many times in our life. However, just one oblivious moment is needed, one moment of doubt—do I know how to?—and sleep stays, until you die.

The exhibition can be visited from 27 March until 27 July. The official opening is on 25 April.