Dana Meyer's (*1982) sculptures possess a timeless sovereignty. Her practice is sophisticated and bold, because without preparations or models she forges her sculptures freehandedly from steel. Her sculptural works are full of tension, powerful, and dynamic. Meyer exclusively depicts animals and humans, individually, in groups, sometimes fragmented, yet always strong in their statement, both realist and expressive. Between human and animal figures, Meyer recognises a partly metaphorical, partly portrait-like “corporeal kinship� which is able to dissolve the clearly drawn boundaries between the two spheres. Text in English and German.

Ellen Akimoto's (*1988) painting is figurative, contemporary, and captivating in its inventiveness. As Wolfgang Ullrich notes, she does not simply cite "stylistic means from the repertoire of the more recent history of painting," but instead combines them "in surprising, humorous relations to one another and, in combination, transforms them into something new." Thus, the "monochrome surfaces of Suprematism" alternate with a meticulously detailed realism originating from Neue Sachlichkeit or a "painted landscape painting is suddenly transformed into an abstract painting" and "merges with the face of a woman." Text in English and German.

The painter Nguyen Xuan Huy (*1976) is an enlightener. Born in Vietnam, he came to Europe at the age of 17, first studying in Bordeaux, and then in Halle. As a result of his own life story, he considers the precise and above all logical analysis of reality to be much more than just ideology. It is specifically this special viewpoint that makes him a noteworthy protagonist of current painting. His technically brilliant paintings therefore often appear to be allegories charged with mythology or philosophy for the intellectual condition of our apparently totally unfettered present. Text in English and German.

A quiet revolution is going on in contemporary painting; young artists are ignoring the taboos of modernism and delving into figurative painting. The exhibition >1000 Words at the Galerie Rothamel is staying abreast of this development. For five centuries European painting depicted histories, faces, and legends. As development began speeding up, modernism broke with this tradition and shifted the artistic snapshot, the shock, into focus. The longing for stories remained. The painters in the exhibition >1000 Words took up the challenge. Their narratives are complex, virtuoso - and astoundingly traditional. Artists: Ellen Akimoto, Undine Bandelin, Ivana de Vivanco, Jonathan Kraus, Nguyen Xuan Huy, Marten Schadlich. Text in English and German.