OPENINGS

OPENINGS IN THE INTERNATIONAL CONTEMPORARY ARTWORLD DURING THE 1990S

PHOTOGRAPHS BY
CAROLINE NATHUSIUS

In this photobook, 775 photographs across 320 pages provide an insight into the spirit of the art scene on the eve of the digital age. OPENINGS is a photographic book depicting the protagonists of an art world that was only just becoming globalized. Caroline Nathusius’ images were taken in various locations including Berlin, Brussels, Frankfurt, Cologne, Munich, New York, and Stockholm. An extensive index of names and exhibitions makes OPENINGS a work of reference in terms of the artists, gallerists, exhibition organizers, publishers, collectors, and authors active during that era.

A book for people who move in the art world, but one especially for anybody who enjoys looking at photographs of people.

22 contemporaries have contributed short texts at the invitation of the author: Bruno Brunnet, Brian Butler, Stephanie Cash, Stephan Dillemuth, Mark Dion, Martin Guttmann, Barbara Hess, Jon Kessler, Kiron Khosla, Susanne Kleine, Hung-min Krämer, Josephine Meckseper, Michaela Melián, Sabine Elsa Müller, Caroline Nathusius, Tanja Pol, Julia Scher, Claudia Sedlarz, Cathy Skene, Iskender Yediler, Lisa Zeiger

320 pages
775 photos
30.3 × 21.6 cm | 12 × 8.5 in

OPENINGS is available for 48 € in the stores of Buchhandlung Walther König and can also be ordered directly by email.

INDEX OF PEOPLE DEPICTED IN THE BOOK

OPENINGS also provides a memory of those who have departed all too early.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Caroline Nathusius, born in 1960, is a photographer, exhibition organizer, and publisher of limited editions. Since 1991 she has been taking photographs within the milieu of the contemporary art world, which she is likewise a part of. A description of her imagery as social documentary photography is made particularly apparent in her publication OPENINGS. She lives with her partner and dog Nike between Cologne and Baden-Württemberg, as a result her most recent photographs have likewise been situated in both urban and rural areas.

In October 2021 she says: “The intense era of the 1990s, which was full of countless visits to exhibition openings and the short trips which they involved, are preserved in the vivid memories of my photographs. I hope that my book OPENINGS makes a contribution to that chapter of social art history and inspires younger contemporaries to imagine how the art scene’s social spaces were used during the period. The book also bears witness to how everyday social and professional life are inextricably linked in the art world.”

VITA

1989–1993 director of Galerie KUBINSKI KÖLN, Cologne

1994–1999 living in NYC – worked in Lawrence Weiner’s studio and during the same period opened an exhibition space at NY-Security-Mini-Storage in TriBeCa

1992–1999 producing limited editions with younger but also such well-known artists as Mark Dion, Laura Emrick, Imi Knoebel, Helene von Oldenburg, Yvonne Parent, Rosemarie Trockel, Lawrence Weiner, and Heimo Zobernig under the name Pinguin Editionen

2000–2003 living in Cologne and opening her own gallery

2004–2007 working at Art Cologne and curating POLLENFLUG and POLLENFLUG AUSTRIA with works from Rhineland and Austrian collections / jury member for Art Cologne NEW CONTEMPORARIES, a program supporting emerging artists

2005–2008 artistic director of kjubh Kunstverein in Cologne

2009–2011 artistic director of Temporary Gallery in Cologne

2012 transferring her photographic archive, documenting exhibition openings during the 1990s, to ZADIK Zentralarchiv für deutsche und internationale Kunstmarktforschung, Cologne

2013 VON KÖLN NACH NEW YORK UND ZURÜCK, a solo exhibition at ZADIK, Cologne

since 2014 living and working in Cologne and Baden-Württemberg as a photographer and exhibition organiser