Artists

Walid Raad

Press release

Central element of the exhibition is the walkthrough: a combined performance and tour in which the artist guides visitors through several rooms in the collection of the Kunsthaus Zürich. The project is the first cooperation between the Kunsthaus Zürich and the Zürcher Theater Spektakel, and opens up a cross-disciplinary dialogue between the visual arts and theatre.


A labyrinthine expedition through the collection

Walid Raad's project at the Kunsthaus Zürich sheds light on key questions about museums in the 21st century. It questions what specific forms of storytelling museums make possible today and what art institutions stand for when the distinction between private and public collections is blurring. Raad deals with the untold stories and gaps as well as the silences inscribed within the exhibited objects and how these can be revealed and conveyed. The exhibition mirrors current changes in societal values and pinpoints the major challenges facing cultural institutions in the 21st century. These are especially relevant to the Kunsthaus Zürich, as the issue of how to deal with the Emil Bührle collection has shown. Raad proceeds from the proliferation of public and private, Western and non-Western art collections and museums. His emphasis is as much on the worldly forces that condition their forms, as it is on the “otherworldly,” intangible, and counter-intuitive cracks they manifest.