JENSEITS DER STERNE (SOLO)
GALERIE OEL-FRÜH

The exhibition Jenseits der Sterne explores the commercial appropriation of spiritual and emotional values in modern consumer culture. Large-scale paintings and an altar installation combine to create a visual narrative that reflects the interplay between happiness, spirituality, and consumption.

︎ 07. Februar – 02. März 2025
︎ Galerie Oel-Früh, Hamburg
︎ photos documentation: Edward Greiner, photos opening: Maximilian Probst

The exhibition is supported by Claussen-Simon-Stiftung and Behörde für Kultur und Medien Hamburg.

The works in the exhibition question how everyday objects cater to spiritual or emotional desires and how immaterial ideals such as happiness, self-awareness, and success are commodified into consumable goods. Towering tarot card paintings serve as an exemplary reference to consumer products that promise enlightenment, insight, or spiritual guidance, highlighting the growing trend of embedding immaterial values and spiritual longings into the logic of consumption.

The exhibition’s altar installation is a ritual space that feels both familiar and alien. Everyday objects such as lottery tickets and healing stones merge with pop-cultural references like video games and iconic brand logos. The apparent grandeur of the altar is disrupted by its ironic composition: a belt adorned with glued-on stars references rating systems, while a medikit from the video game universe – complemented by a pillbox – parodies the obsession with happiness and health.

At the same time, the displayed offerings emphasize a darker side of the theme, suggesting that consumerism is not merely superficially hedonistic but possesses an almost unsettling seriousness in how it manipulates needs and desires, while drawing on ancient ritualistic patterns.

Traces of consumed products, such as empty fortune cookie wrappers, Double Happiness cigarette boxes, and gnawed apple underscore the perpetual search for happiness and insight. Blood-red apples, symbolic of the Tree of Knowledge, ironically allude to the fairy tale of Snow White, where the apple leads to an inescapable slumber – a double-edged metaphor for awareness and stagnation.

The Fountain of Happiness installed in the space invites visitors to find happiness in life. This call reflects the widespread belief that happiness is achievable only through external means – a notion that reduces happiness to a measurable benchmark against which people evaluate themselves and others.

The exhibition examines how happiness and self-awareness become performance ideals and marketable promises. Training positive feelings becomes a tool for being more productive, focused, and efficient. This happiness training serves not only personal growth but also the goal of functioning as a “perfect machine” within a capitalist system where success and happiness are inextricably linked.

Jenseits der Sterne thus becomes a space that playfully reflects how today’s consumer goods – from mundane items to iconic products – are used to create everyday rituals that promote well-being and offer stability in a world shaped by dystopias. At the same time, the consumer-oriented approach often remains superficial, intensifying the pressure to conform to unattainable ideals. The exhibition questions how these mechanisms shape our relationship with spirituality, identity, and societal values.