The exhibition

In Well Beings, an interactive installation by the artist Valentina Karga, visitors can confront their feelings, worries and fears about the climate crisis. Due to the immediate consequences of climate change, more and more people suffer from a chronic fear of doom, which is accompanied by feelings of helplessness, anger or guilt and can lead to panic attacks, nervousness, sleep disorders and even depression. The market has responded to this anxiety with a huge range of consumer products such as weighted blankets, hug pillows and stuffed animals. These objects inspire Karga and form the starting point for her work. At the same time, she discovered idols - prehistoric figures of abstracted creatures made of marble and clay - in the museum's Antiquities Collection. For the artist, they represent a distinct cultural heritage, and symbolize a closeness to nature. Using natural and recycled materials, she has created figures and forms based on the idols that visitors can touch and embrace.

Valentina Karga's (* 1986, Greece) work operates between art, design, research and architecture. It draws together elements of socially-engaged practice with experiments that question the existing social and physical frameworks within the realms of energy, economy and sustainability. Since 2018 Valentina Karga has been Professor at the Hochschule für bildende Künste (HFBK), Hamburg.

The exhibition will be accompanied by a public programme (see details below), "Well Beings in Times of Climate Anxiety", conceived by Seda Yildiz and Valentina Karga. The supporting programme is a project of HFBK Hamburg and the Hamburg Open Online University (HOOU).