Frieze Yearbook 2005

Ulrike Kuschel’s photography-based practice explores the legacy of Communism in the former German Democratic Republic and Eastern Europe. Whether documenting what remains of the ‘Red Riveria’ camping resorts along the Bulgarian Black Sea coast, or a development in a Berlin park dedicated to Ernst Thalmann – the Communist Party of Germany leader executed by the Nazis – Kuschel’s camera witnesses the aftermath of the ideology of the worker. A 2003 series of men at work, ‘May 2nd 2002’, pays homage to trade-union propaganda of the past – only here the workers are replacing shopping mall facades that had been shattered contemporary Berlin’s vandalizing observance of Labour Day. (MA)

Ausstellung Laub, Galerie Klosterfelde, Berlin, 2003