Passagen – Passages
As in earlier works, Passagen - Passages will explore questions of the historicity of places, memory and language as well as their inherent moments of (re)construction and projection. The artistic research process, which revolves around the reception history of individual biographies, will later be translated into multimedia installations and audio works.
The starting point for Passagen - Passages is Marseille, the oldest and second largest city in France and for centuries a hub for migration, flight and exile. 90 percent of the city's current population have ancestors who came from abroad. Throughout its history, the city has welcomed waves of migrants, from those fleeing wars and persecution to those seeking a better life. During the Second World War, Marseille was one of the main escape and transit points for people seeking exile from all over Europe. Thousands of refugees from the territories occupied by the German Wehrmacht attempted to leave Europe from here. Tales of migration and exile also shape the city's present.
One aim of the artistic research project is to resist simple narratives and instead trace the multi-layered intersections of migration, exile, map and urban landscape. Passagen - Passages, an intervention in the present - an exploration of what remains, what shifts, what emerges in a city that is constantly defined by passage.
Michaela Melián, visual artist and musician, is known for her multimedia installations, radio plays and sound works. She is a member of the band F.S.K. (Freiwillige Selbstkontrolle) and co-published the artist magazine Mode & Verzweiflung. From 2010 to 2023 she taught as a professor for time-based media at the University of Fine Arts Hamburg (HFBK). Melián lives near Munich and in Marseille.
Her works have been exhibited at Lenbachhaus Munich, Fundació Juan Miró Barcelona, Kunsthal Rotterdam, Staatsgalerie Stuttgart, Kunsthalle Mannheim, Cubitt London, Galerie im Taxispalais Innsbruck, Lentos Museum Linz, MAK Vienna, Ludlow New York and Deichtorhallen Hamburg, among others. In 2010, she was commissioned by the City of Munich to create Memory Loops, an acoustic memorial to the victims of National Socialism. In 2017, she designed the Herminengasse exit at the Schottenring subway station in Vienna. Michaela Melián has received numerous awards for her work. For example, in 2005 she received the Hörspielpreis der Kriegsblinden/Preis für Audiokunst for Föhrenwald, in 2010 the Kunstpreis der Stadt München, in 2018 the Edwin Scharff Kunstpreis der Stadt Hamburg and the Preis für Kunst im öffentlichen Raum der Stadt Bremen. In 2014, Melián's film music for Frauke Finsterwalder's feature film Finsterworld was nominated for the German Film Award in the »Best Film Music« category.
»Red Threads«, KINDL – Zentrum für Zeitgenössische Kunst, Berlin (Hg.), Texte von Nadja Abt, Kathrin Becker, Hanne Loreck, Magdalena Mai, Katja Kynast, Ingrid Wagner, Joanna Warsza, Leipzig: Spector Books 2023
»Lerchenfeld 59, Counter Monuments and Para-Monuments«, Reader zum gleichnamigen Symposium an der HfbK Hamburg, Hamburg 2021.
»Dishammonia«, Text Niklaas Maak, Leipzig: Spector Books 2019.
»Electric Ladyland«, mit einliegender LP und CD, Lenbachhaus München und Buchhandlung Walther König (Hg.), Texte von Eva Huttenlauch, Jan Kedves, Matthias Mühling, Laurence A. Rickels, München 2016.
»Memory Loops – 300 Tonspuren zu Orten des NS-Terrors in München«, Akustisches Denkmal im Auftrag der Stadt München, www.memoryloops.net, München 2010.
»Sammlung Siegfried Fuchs«, in: RECOLLECTING. Raub und Restitution, MAK Wien 2008.
Die künstlerischen Forschungsprojekte von Michaela Melián stellen Fragen nach der Historizität von Orten, Erinnerung und Sprache sowie den ihnen innewohnenden Momenten der (Re-)Konstruktion und Projektion verfolgt werden.