Your body is yours

Wolfgang Tillmans’s photographs actively wedge themselves in the cracks of the reality around us; with their silence, vulnerability, intimacy, and closeness, sometimes they fill and other times they further stretch these slits. The exhibition at Trafó Gallery – which is the artist’s first solo show in Hungary – can also be considered such a crevice; a crevice that opens up space for unintimidated human contact and moments of safety and freedom; a space where not only one singular norm and truth are acceptable. Tillmans’s approach is radically open and hopeful in this sense.

Few artists have shaped the scope of contemporary art and influenced a younger generation more than Wolfgang Tillmans. Throughout his career to this point, his works have been challenging the limits of image-making and ushered in a new kind of subjectivity in photography, combining intimacy and playfulness with social critique and the persistent questioning of existing values and hierarchies. The artist seamlessly integrates genres, subjects, techniques, and exhibition strategies without establishing any kind of hierarchy between them.

Ever since his early works focusing on the new social and cultural order emerging after the AIDS crisis and the fall of the Berlin Wall, his practice has been informed by strong political awareness. This approach also manifested in acts of openly taking a stand in certain political issues. In recent years, his political commitment has gone beyond the practice of image-making; and in the spirit of social activism and solidarity, Tillmans launched campaigns for several causes (eg. advocating against Brexit in 2016 and for an increased voter turnout in the European Election) organized by the Between Bridges foundation that he founded in 2017. The foundation supports the arts, LGBT+ rights and anti-racism work.

>> We can only grant entry to Trafó to visitors with a vaccination certificate. Please note that in order to respect social distancing, we will not hold an opening speech, and that only a maximum of 20 people can stay in the exhibition space at a time, thank you for your patience and understanding! We warmly invite those who are waiting to enter the gallery for a glass of wine on the roof terrace of Trafó. All visitors are required to wear a mask in the exhibition space and inside Trafó.