Since its foundation in 1969, the neue Gesellschaft für bildende Kunst (nGbK, until 2013: NGBK) has been a place for the negotiation of art and democracy. The focal point was and is the question how individual citizens can shape society — a new society — and in this particular case its field of activity is the fine arts. With regards to the democratically organized art association and its members, this means not only criticizing, but also assuming responsibility with the means of art.
This focus is reflected above all in the repeatedly controversial and urgent questions addressed by the projects. Already in the first exhibition in 1969 of John Heartfield’s work, art was understood as a weapon for emancipation and against fascism and, at the same time, referring to the exploitation of working people and serving as a public counter-model.
In well over 500 projects, strategies of different and new ways of thinking have come together with the aim of posing socially relevant questions and taking action in order to have a retroactive effect on society. To this day, the nGbK’s commitment extends forward into public space where the power of art repeatedly proves itself and reveals its democratic and political potential – as e.g. in the context of the art competition »Art in the Underground«, which has been runned by nGbK since 1991.
 
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Website: https://ngbk.de/