Käthe Kruse: It's All Good Now

The artist Käthe Kruse (*1958) has been an integral part of Berlin’s art scene since the early 1980s. A member of West Berlin’s well-known music and artists’ group Die Tödliche Doris, she worked from 1982 to 1987 in the intersection between performance, music, text, painting, and film. To this day, Kruse also maintains a cross-genre approach and deliberate amateurism in her solo projects, creating large-scale installations that combine a variety of media and forms of expression. Her departure points frequently consist in everyday objects that she physically alters while assigning new meanings to them. Kruse’s works are often closely linked to her personal experience, but also reference larger social problems and topics such as domestic violence, abortion, and war.

With “Käthe Kruse: It’s All Good Now,” the Berlinische Galerie pays tribute in its anniversary year to Kruse’s remarkable work from the 1980s to the present day. It is the first major institutional retrospective in Berlin. The approximately 50 works, among them large-scale installations, offer insight into her highly diverse oeuvre. The exhibition shows painting, object art, videos, photography, sound works, and performances. Kruse’s work is not presented in chronological order, but according to thematic connections among the works on view. This corresponds to Kruse’s artistic practice, for which transformation plays a special role. In addition to everyday objects, Kruse alters completed works to situate them in entirely new contexts. The result is that her work is always in a state of flux.

Live performances have been part of Käthe Kruse’s artistic work since the beginning, and the exhibition pays tribute to this important aspect. In the performance “Konzert in Leder” (Concert in Leather), Käthe Kruse and her musician friends will play all the leather-covered instruments from Die Tödliche Doris for the first time (10 April). Visitors can also experience the well-known works “3927 Wörter” (3927 Words) on 8 May and “Krieg” (War) on 22 May respectively. Participating artists: Sophia Bicking, Danielle de Picciotto, Myriam El Haik, Alexander Hacke, Edda Kruse Rosset and Alma Neumann

A bilingual catalogue (German/English) with texts by Marie Arleth Skov, Thomas Köhler, Miriam Schoofs und Ilka Voermann will be published by DISTANZ Verlag to accompany the exhibition. It's available at the museum shop for 29,80 €.

About the artist
In 1981, Käthe Kruse left Bünde in North Rhine-Westphalia, where she was born and raised, and moved into the squat at Manteuffelstrasse 40/41 in Berlin. One year later, she met Wolfgang Müller und Nikolaus Utermöhlen of Die Tödliche Doris. She became a member in 1982 and remained the group’s drummer until 1987. Kruse studied visual communication at the Hochschule der Künste Berlin (now the University of the Arts) from 1990 to 1996, graduated from Heinz Emigholz’s master class, and received a scholarship for the promotion of young talent. She received artist’s grants from the Stiftung Kulturfonds in 2004 and the Senate Department for Cultural Affairs in 2008 (both in Berlin). In 2021 Kruse was awarded a scholarship by the Peter Jacobi Foundation for Art and Design in Pforzheim. She received a NEUSTART KULTUR grant from the Stiftung Kunstfonds in Bonn (2020–2023) and has been president of the International Artists’ Committee (IKG) since 2023.