Curator Lizzy Ellbrück: "The examen exhibition is a process"
Lizzy Ellbrück is curating this year's Kunsthochschule Kassel (KhK) Examen Exhibition, which can be seen from December 10 to 17 in the documenta-Halle in Kassel.
The documenta-Halle, the venue for the Examen Exhibition 2025, is known for its special architecture. With its postmodern constructivist design language, the building also impresses the curator: "The hall has its own language and rigor. Its transparency demands presence; the width, height and lines of sight offer great freedom, but at the same time require precise positioning so that the works do not get lost. For an exhibition with around 65 graduates, this means thinking very carefully about neighborhoods, density and tranquility," explains Ellbrück.
The graduation team has been working intensively on the realization of the exhibition since summer 2025. The team has taken on specific tasks in various working groups - coordination, curation, mediation, graphics and catering. The phase of getting to know each other was particularly important for Lizzy Ellbrück in order to better understand the graduates' work. At the same time, structures had to be created that would enable the heterogeneous team to work together productively: "We had to find a conceptual framework that would give us orientation as a team, but at the same time leave room for different perspectives and design approaches," emphasizes the curator.
In collaboration with Johanna Schäfer - designer, editor and artistic collaborator at the KhK - the artist is developing an exhibition concept that sees itself as a maquette: "As a rehearsal, model, stage and performance that remains open and provisional at the same time. It is about the simultaneity of conclusion and beginning - a temporary ensemble that shows what was and what could come," says Ellbrück.
The range of projects on display is challenging - and this is precisely one of the strengths of the examen exhibition. The exhibition designer explains how this field of tension is taken into account curatorially: "The challenge is to develop a structure that keeps the diversity visible and does not turn it into a standardization. It is about dealing sensitively with scales, media and intensities and testing spaces in which resonances, frictions and dialogues can arise."
In her practice, the artist and curator operates at the interfaces of different disciplines and moves between spatial, visual, textual and conceptual dimensions. "I critically engage with the act of making, the gesture of showing and the politics of the gaze. My curatorial practice is articulated in collaborative alliances, spatial assemblages, choreographies and words. It is defined by my repertoire of methods and strategies - as well as my fascination with the potential of placing in relation," says Ellbrück.
The curator hopes that examen will be seen as an open platform: "Not just as a conclusion or exhibition, but as a process. It should make the diversity of artistic and creative positions visible and at the same time create connections between the works, the graduates and the visitors."
The graduation exhibition opens on Wednesday evening, December 10, 2025, and will be shown for the first time for one week. Visitors to the exhibition can look forward to seeing how Lizzy Ellbrück and Johanna Schäfer bring together the extraordinary number of artists and designers in a group exhibition and allow the individual positions to unfold dramaturgically.
Lizzy Ellbrück (*1990) is an artist and curator. She studied interdisciplinary art studies (B.A.), scenography, curatorial practice and exhibition and communication design (Dipl. Szen) at the Technical University, the Berlin University of the Arts and the Karlsruhe University of Arts and Design. In solo presentations and group exhibitions, both nationally and internationally, she has exhibited at the Badischer Kunstverein Karlsruhe, the Center for Art and Media (ZKM Pavilion) and the Kunstverein Bruchsal, among others - together with Johanna Schäfer. In 2024/25 she was a scholarship holder of the state of Baden-Württemberg at the Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris. Johanna Schäfer and Lizzy Ellbrück have been working together as artists, curators and designers since 2022. In their work, they experiment with forms of textual, visual and spatial staging as well as their narrative and speculative dimensions.
(Text in German: Çiğdem Özdemir)
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