Key Chain

The group exhibition Behind Eyes takes place as part of a collaboration with BIENALSUR, the International Biennale of Contemporary Art in Latin America. Since its founding in 2016 by the Universidad Nacional de Tres de Febrero (UNTREF) in Buenos Aires, BIENALSUR has connected institutions and artists worldwide, promoted diversity, and emphasized global perspectives. The biennale simultaneously spans over 32 cities in 16 countries, bringing together more than 350 artists and curators from five continents.

The exhibition is dedicated to the space behind our closed eyes and refers to this year’s exploration of the “eye” at Kunstverein Bielefeld. The institution’s annual program is part of a five-year curatorial project, which, similar to the chapters of a book, focuses on one sense organ each year to raise questions relevant to our present.

This year’s exhibitions are perceived as “schools of seeing,” not only examining what is visible but also exploring the collective efficacy of invisible processes.

The exhibition Behind Eyes turns the view inward, focusing on the space behind our closed eyes, where images arise before they take form.

In a time when the visible dominates—through screens, surveillance, or the constant need for evidence—the exhibition Behind Eyes sets a counterpoint: a practice of inner seeing.

Behind Eyes brings together international artistic positions that interrogate the act of seeing in diverse ways, encouraging reflection on visual narrative structures and prevailing systems of representation, and understanding seeing as an aesthetic, media-theoretical, social, and political practice.

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We see, glance, observe, take into account, eye, and perceive.What we see is shaped by our experiences, learned conventions, and habits. When and where we look at something influences how we look at it.

In 1972, art critic, writer, and painter ohn Berger demonstrated in his TV series The Ways of Seeing that seeing is not a neutral act but socially, culturally, and historically conditioned—a mobile process. Between what we look at and what we perceive lies an invisible intermediate space of memory, experience, desire, and imagination.

The exhibition Behind Eyes turns the view inward, focusing on the space behind our closed eyes, where images arise before they take form.

In a time when the visible dominates—through screens, surveillance, or the constant need for evidence—the exhibition Behind Eyes sets a counterpoint: a practice of inner seeing.

Media philosopher Vilém Flusser describes this inner seeing as the human ability to think imaginatively and envision the world before it is captured in language or technology. For him, inner seeing is a creative act through which humans generate meaning and develop their own internal images and interpretations.

In the age of digital images, this kind of seeing and its associated imaginative capacity are undergoing transformations. Visual media contribute to constructing reality and influence how we perceive and create meaning. Imagination is thus subjected to preordained perspectives and patterns and, according to Flusser, loses autonomy. Against this backdrop, he advocates for the conscious reclamation of the inner vision—not as a mere retreat into subjective interiority but as a reflective practice that questions the act of seeing itself.

The exhibition explores the efficacy of vision and the potential of inner spaces as sources of knowledge. The works on display—from painting, drawing, video, and installation—focus on seeing as an introspective movement, highlighting different qualities. From humorous reflections on the biological sphere of vision, the interrogation of perception as a shared practice and media-reflective tool, to political and social dimensions that reveal invisibilities. The exhibition merges intersections of intimacy and politics, individual and collective experience, and brings them into dialogue.

Curated by Victoria Tarak & Katharina Klang
Coordination South America: Cristina Sommer