Give and Take illustrates processes of exchange and appropriation of pictorial material in contemporary photography based on a selection of twenty artistic positions. Images circulate and migrate these days across diverse geographical, cultural and social boundaries. One and the same photograph may appear in myriad contexts, multiplying its impact exponentially. This makes it nearly impossible to control all the meanings that may be assigned to images we release into the world. In this »give and take«, artists appropriate images from a variety of fields as they explore the mechanisms behind the production of realities and identities. The material on view ranges from early picture archives, historical film footage and museum collections to classic print media as well as digital images on social media and in image search engines. The artists respond in their photographs, video works and installations to images that originated in another time or were developed for a different purpose, retrieving them in order to examine them in the light of the present day. The show features primarily works on loan that come from galleries or directly from the artists from America and Europe, supplemented by exhibits from the collection of the Hamburger Kunsthalle. As if in an archive, the main themes are organised into »folders«: archive & algorithm, profile & identity, fact & fiction, protest & dissemination and canon & violence.
Featured artists: Viktoria Binschtok, Josephin Böttger, Adam Broomberg & Oliver Chanarin, Irene Chabr, Sara Cwynar, Katharina Gaenssler, Mathilde ter Heijne, Sabine Hornig, Louise Lawler, Matthew Muir, Frida Orupabo, Max Pinckers, Walid Raad, Volker Renner, Sebastian Riemer, Martha Rosler, Evan Roth, Thomas Ruff, Taryn Simon and Johannes Wohnseifer.