Ecstasy

Ecstasy
April 4–August 4, 2019

Opening: April 3, 6pm

In spring 2019, the Zentrum Paul Klee dwells on the ecstasy—one of the oldest and most astonishing cultural phenomena. The exhibition showcases 230 works from antiquity to the present day.

A desire for moments of intense pleasure and passion is a universal feature of human existence. The amount of cultural, social and religious rituals and practices that seek to bring about ecstasy, or translate ecstatic states of being into words, images, music or bodily expressions is practically endless. This exhibition highlights the intensity and ambivalence of ecstatic experiences and showcases exceptional work by artists like Marlene Dumas, Meret Oppenheim, Auguste Rodin, Henri Michaux, Andy Warhol and Paul Klee in surprising juxtapositions. The works of these artists explore ecstasy as a bodily and physical state of exception, situated at the threshold between pleasure and pain, creativity and madness, spiritual transcendence and physical self-destruction, liberation and dependency, life and death.

A collaboration between the Kunstmuseum Stuttgart and the Zentrum Paul Klee.