COPENHAGEN.- Simian announced two upcoming exhibitions: Why am I me?, a solo exhibition by the artist Laura Langer, and a presentation of the seminal compostion La Légende d’Eer by the Greek composer Iannis Xenakis.
The second edition of the film program Extended Views is presented in Simian‘s cinema in collaboration with KADIST. The program features video works from the KADIST collection selected in relation to the current exhibitions.
Why am I me? is Laura Langer’s first solo exhibition in Denmark. For the show, the artist transforms Simian’s main exhibition space by means of an architectural intervention: a corridor-shaped sequence leads the visitors in a winding movement through a dense display of her work, making use of the venue’s large scale to gather and rearrange in one single space almost one hundred paintings in a non chronological order. Many of the works have been taken out from storage for this occasion to be reactivated, addressing, among other things, questions around speed of production, circulation, personal motivation, and public evaluation.
The setup forces new connections and dialogues between the works, highlighting the heterogeneity and diverse visual languages throughout Langer’s painterly practice. Retracing the artist’s development over the past decade, Why am I me? facilitates a reflection on the works’ internal logic and changing meanings, while also pointing beyond the present moment. More than simply displaying past works, the exhibition is an introspective gesture, an exercise in self-inquiry, and an attempt to understand and integrate the many threads of her evolving artistic identity.
The exhibition in Simian’s second space is dedicated to the artistic legacy of Iannis Xenakis (1922–2001). Before entering the installation, visitors are introduced to the composer’s universe through original drawings—scores related to the piece presented inside. With a duration of more than 45 minutes, La Légende d’Eer is one of Xenakis’ longest and most influential electroacoustic works. Xenakis developed the work as the soundtrack of his show Le Diatope, a commission which was conceived for the inauguration of the Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris in 1977–78, and spanned multiple mediums including sound, light, text, and an architectural structure.
The composition itself, entitled aher the final part of Plato’s The Republic, was produced at the WDR studios in Cologne and premiered at the Planetarium in Bochum. Combining instrumental recordings, computer-generated sounds, and noise, it’s characterised by a dramaturgical tension between synthetic and organic elements, between denser and lighter, louder and quieter sequences. Composed of seven individual tracks, La Légende d’Eer is here set up as an immersive spatialised 10 channel audio installation. The installation presents a newly restored version, made from the original tapes, recently rediscovered and remastered by Pierre Carré at Ircam, Paris, to reconstruct the original presentation as closely as possible. The exhibition is accompanied by a newly commissioned podcast about Xenakis, produced by composer and music theorist Chris Cutler.
KADIST and Simian present Extended Views II, the second part of a collaborative film program showcasing a curated selection of moving-image works from KADIST’s extensive collection, selected by the artists and curators exhibiting at Simian. This second iteration includes selections by Laura Langer, whose works are being shown in the solo exhibition titled Why am I me?, and a selection by Simian for Iannis Xenakis, whom the presentation La Légende d’Eer in the second exhibition room is dedicated to.
Extended Views explores diverse artistic expressions and practices, unfolding the underlying ideas brought into conversation by the exhibiting artists at Simian. The films and video works from artists in the KADIST archive create a dynamic dialogue, influencing and enhancing each other. This program invites visitors to explore the concepts and sensibilities of the current exhibitions through their interplay with the films presented in the screening room.
Laura Langer (b. 1986, Buenos Aires, Argentina) is an artist living and working in Berlin. Recent solo and duo exhibitions include Potential d’en face, Établissement d’en Face, Brussels (2025); Mothers, Ilenia, London (2024); Execution, Lodos, Mexico (2023); Lateral, Braunsfelder, Cologne (2023); Headlines, Kunsthaus Glarus, Glarus (2022); Homesick, The Wig, Berlin, and Weiss Falk, Basel (2021); Liberty, Kunsthalle Portikus, Frankfurt am Main (2020); and The World Is Round, Piper Keys, London (2018). Her work has been exhibited in numerous group exhibitions at institutions and galleries such as Westfälischer Kunstverein, Münster; Galerie Oskar Weiss, Zurich; Clementin Seedorf, Cologne; Capitain Petzel, Berlin; Galerie Eva Presenhuber, Zurich; Drei, Cologne; XYZ Collective, Tokyo; MMK, Frankfurt am Main; and Museo de Arte Moderno de Buenos Aires. In 2021, she received the Hessische Kulturstihung studio scholarship for a one-year residency in London.
Iannis Xenakis (1922–2001) was a Greek-French composer, architect, and theorist who lived and worked in Paris. He was a central figure in the post-war avant-garde and known for integrating mathematics, probability theory, and architectural models into musical composition, including in works such as Metastasis (1953), Pithoprakta (1956), and Persephassa (1969). He also worked as an architect for Le Corbusier and was the driving force behind the groundbreaking Philips Pavilion for the 1958 World’s Fair in Brussels. In the 1960s and 70s, he developed spatial works, known as polytopes, in which sound, light, and architecture merge. He founded CEMAMu in Paris and developed the UPIC system, which made it possible to compose music graphically using computer technology.
