MUNICH.- What does art provoke in us? To what extent does our view of art depend on our personal experiences and memories? Which feelings emerge as we contemplate works of art, if our gaze is led by intuition alone?

The exhibition Feelings on view at Pinakothek der Moderne seeks to encourage this direct dialogue between artwork and viewer in order to stimulate an intense emotional engagement. The works exhibited are characterized by enigmatic motifs and atmospheric visual spaces. Joy, excitement, anger, revulsion, sadness, and numerous other emotional reactions may ensue upon viewing the works. The choice of exhibits is subjective; the art historical context and explanatory wall texts have been deliberately omitted.

When does a picture attract us, when does it repel us? The study of emotions is still a young branch of psychology, sociology, history, and neuroscience. Ever since the Enlightenment, the focus has been on humankind as primarily rational beings; their view of the world and images was dominated by intellect above all else. Today, however, it can be proven that emotions have much more influence over us than we have previously wanted to admit. It is no coincidence that politics and advertising have long—and thoroughly manipulatively—relied on using images to evoke feelings and then utilized these for their own ends. Art, on the other hand, is formed in free contexts, creates a purely personal relationship with the audience, and exists without a discernible purpose.

The contemplation of works of art offers the opportunity to become more familiar with one’s own emotional world, for it is not uncommon for images to trigger associations with experiences that literally “get under your skin” and are sometimes stored for a long time. Art touches upon our personal emotional archive. Whether works are perceived as pleasant or unpleasant, whether they confuse or delight, all essentially depends on the stored experience.

More importance is usually ascribed to reasoning than to feelings when viewing art, for it seems to contradict its complexity and intellectual depth. This dominance of the rational discourages many people from engaging with contemporary art in particular.

FEELINGS wishes to subvert these threshold fears, for intuition represents an essential approach to art. After all, the creation of a work is also based on personal experience. FEELINGS seeks to highlight this perspective on art.

The exhibition features contributions from the following artists:

Hans Aichinger, Monika Baer, Heike Kathi Barath, Vlassis Caniaris, Gregory Crewdson, Alex Da Corte, Nathalie Djurberg and Hans Berg, Drei Hamburger Frauen, Marlene Dumas, Elmgreen & Dragset, Tracey Emin, Gotthard Graubner, Jenny Holzer, Thilo Jenssen, Tadeusz Kantor, Ruprecht von Kaufmann, Mike Kelley and Paul McCarthy, Jochen Klein, Rosa Loy, Rosilene Luduvico, Stephan Melzl, Olaf Metzel, Miwa Ogasawara, Catherine Opie, Laura Owens, Richard Prince, Bernhard Prinz, Alexandra Ranner, Wilhelm Sasnal, Markus Schinwald , Norbert Schwontkowski, Cindy Sherman, Sam Taylor Johnson, Jessica Vaughn, Gillian Wearing, Amelie von Wulffen, and Artur Zmijewski.

The exhibited works are from the holdings of the Bavarian State Painting Collections, the Goetz Collection, and other private collections.

Curators: Bernhart Schwenk and Nicola Graef