Event as part of the memorial service on the occasion of the first anniversary of Günther Uecker's death
June 10, 2026 marks the first anniversary of the death of Günther Uecker, whose name the Mecklenburg-Vorpommern State Library bears. Together with the Günther Uecker Institute, it invites you to a book presentation in its foyer from 7 pm on this day. Günther Uecker Institute scholarship holders Raha Golestani and Konstantin Schönfelder will be presenting their book "Im All der Zeichen. The Semionaut Günther Uecker".
In their interdisciplinary study, Raha Golestani and Konstantin Schönfelder interpret Günther Uecker's working method as a process of "performative translation", following the French art theorist and curator Nicolas Bourriaud. According to them, Uecker acts as a mediator between worlds and medialities, which is particularly evident in his print cycle "Homage to Hafez" (2015). In it, the artist enters into an intercultural aesthetic 'encounter' with the poetry of the 14th century Persian poet Hafez, quoting and visualizing it. This visualization is anything but conventional and should be understood as a performance that can be understood on three levels: linguistic, medial and cultural. According to Golestani and Schönfelder, in his performative practice the artist thus carries out the turn he himself has called for against an essentializing codification, which is also becoming increasingly important in art studies, especially when dealing with 'exotic' symbols and within postcolonial discourses.
Raha Golestani (*1993) is a Tehran-born interdisciplinary artist, scholar and art educator. She lives in Frankfurt am Main. Golestani holds a BFA in Painting (University of Tehran) and an MA in Aesthetics (Goethe University Frankfurt). She completed her master's degree in 2022 with a Goethe Goes Global scholarship on the art of the Persian diaspora. She is currently researching the entanglements of exoticism and self-exoticism in contemporary art with a PhD scholarship at Goethe University. Her cultural work includes stints at the Rooberoo Mansion Cultural Institute in collaboration with the Goethe Institute in Tehran, the Max Planck Institute for Empirical Aesthetics and the Frankfurt School of Painting.
Konstantin Schönfelder (*1994) is a freelance writer based in Frankfurt am Main. After studying political science in Leipzig and Washington, D.C., he completed a master's degree in political theory at Frankfurt's Goethe University. At the same time, he trained as a journalist as part of a scholarship. He is the artistic director of the digital culture project PRÄPOSITION, which is working on a new staging of text and language. His book of essays "Gesellschaft Eine Insel" won the prize as one of the "Most Beautiful German Books" of the Stiftung Buchkunst in 2021. His other works include literary radio features for public radio and text publications (Neue Rundschau, Reportagen Magazin etc.).
The book launch is free of charge and part of the joint series of commemorative events on June 10, 2026. This series starts at 3 p.m. at the Staatliches Museum Schwerin, where the Minister President of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Manuela Schwesig, and the artist's son, Jacob Uecker, will speak. The keynote speech will be given by Dr. Norbert Lammert, former President of the Bundestag. Dirk Rothbrust will provide the musical accompaniment. This event is organized by the Günther Uecker Institute, the SSGK-MV / Staatliches Museum Schwerin and the Ministry of Science, Culture, Federal and European Affairs MV as well as the Friends of the Staatliches Museum Schwerin.
This will be followed at 21:00 in Schwerin Cathedral by the screening of the 30-minute film "Lichtbogen - Günther Uecker und der Schweriner Dom", which documents Uecker's work on the cathedral windows from 2017 to the lithurgical commissioning in 2024.
Registration for the first part (15:00) is possible here: https: //www.guenther-uecker-institut.de/ehrung-guenther-ueckers-zum-ersten-todestag-am-10-juni-in-schwerin/
Registration is not necessary for the other events.
