Max Grau lives in Berlin, where he works as a visual artist and writer. He studied liberal arts at the HBK Saar, the Weissensee Academy of Arts Berlin, and at the Art Center College Pasadena. His work utilizes various media such as video, performance, text, email, audio, photography, and drawing. His meandering interests include: emotional textures of the present, the tense relationship between individual and collectivism, failed utopias, subjectivity damages, and strategic optimism.
He has worked in exhibition and performance both in Germany and abroad, including at Photographer’s Gallery (London), Schwankhalle (Bremen), LACE (Los Angeles), Golden Pudel Club (Hamburg), Mucem (Marseille), Kino Šiška (Ljubljana), Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg, Pet Projects (Perth), and Digital Art Centre (Taipei).
In addition, he has participated in a variety of film festivals, including Short Waves Festival Poznan, Hamburg International Short Film Festival, WNDX Festival of Moving Image Winnipeg, IndieCork Film Festival, Short Film Festival Cologne, International Experimental Film Festival Bucharest, Flatpack Film Festival Birmingham, and Interfilm Berlin.
In 2016 – 2017 he was intensively involved in the *foundationClass at the Weissensee Academy of Arts. Since 2017 he has held sporadic teaching positions at the Weissensee Academy of Art, Kunsthochschule Kassel, SCCA Ljubljana, and the HBK Saar.
In 2018 the book “You See I’ve Always Wanted Things To Be Beautiful” was published by the Hammann von Mier Verlag as part of the publication and exhibition series “Ruine München”.