Wafae Ahalouch el Keriasti’s works may be characterised as alienated portrayals of her view of the world. While Ahalouch’s earlier works centred primarily on the theme of family, she has recently turned to more universal and rather politically oriented content. She often creates series of pictures in which she merges different stories and so conjures completely new images, her works aiming to visualise the contradictions and structures of dependency that lie behind all our social interaction.
Ahalouch’s “The Greatest Show in the World” transforms the exhibition space into the abstracted image of a circus, encompassing murals, painting and installations as well as performance elements. The exhibition is based on Ahalouch’s research into the infamous “Salon Kitty”, a high-class brothel in Berlin which was frequented by prominent Nazis, local eminence and foreign diplomats from the 1930s onwards, its Jewish “madam” Kitty Schmidt being forced to spy for the Nazis. Ahalouch employs the setting of “Circus Kitty” as a universally valid metaphor for the many harmless and attractive facades that conceal an endlessly complex world full of the lust for power, manipulation and abuse.
On the opening evening, at ca. 8 pm, Ahalouch el Keriasti will present “A Small Show in the Greatest Show in the World”, a performance with Dolly Duster as Marlene Dietrich, a burlesque dancer and circus artists.