BRAUNSCHWEIG.- The Museum für Photographie Braunschweig has opened a dialog-driven double exhibition bringing together the work of two major figures in contemporary photography: German portrait photographer Angelika Platen and Finnish artist Elina Brotherus. Presented across the museum’s Gatehouse 1 and Gatehouse 2 spaces, the show explores how portraiture can reveal the complex relationships between artists, identity, and the social role of art.

Although separated by generation and artistic approach, both photographers examine what it means to represent artists and artistic practice. Platen, born in 1942, is widely regarded as one of the key visual chroniclers of the international art scene since the late 1960s. Brotherus, born in 1972, approaches portraiture from a more conceptual and introspective angle, often using self-staged imagery and symbolic references to reflect on artistic identity.

Angelika Platen: documenting the art world in transformation

In Gatehouse 1, the exhibition highlights Platen’s portraits and documentary photographs from the late 1960s and early 1970s — a period marked by radical experimentation and the emergence of new avant-garde movements. Working initially in black and white, Platen captured artists at moments when contemporary art was redefining itself, creating images that are both historically valuable and visually striking.

Her photographs often reveal the personality of her subjects through carefully composed yet natural encounters, offering intimate glimpses into the lives and working environments of artists. Over time, her practice expanded to include portraits of women artists and the use of color photography, further broadening the scope of her work, which now spans more than five decades.

A dedicated section of the exhibition focuses on Joseph Beuys, whose influential “expanded concept of art” and politically engaged actions reshaped artistic discourse in postwar Europe. Platen’s documentation of Beuys and other performance-based practices underscores how experimental art of the time pushed beyond traditional forms and became intertwined with broader social debates.

Among the highlights is her well-known mirror double portrait with Sigmar Polke, taken during a visit to the artist in the early 1970s. Such images have become iconic not only as portraits, but also as visual documents of a formative era in contemporary art history.

Elina Brotherus: rethinking portraiture through metaphor and performance

Gatehouse 2 presents Elina Brotherus’s photographic and film works, which reinterpret portraiture through staged compositions, symbolic gestures, and art-historical references. Internationally exhibited but previously only sporadically shown in Lower Saxony, Brotherus’s work here enters into a thoughtful dialogue with Platen’s more documentary approach.

Rather than recording artists directly, Brotherus often constructs images that reflect on artistic identity itself. In recent projects, she has explored the legacy of figures such as Joseph Beuys, translating elements of his ideas into metaphorical visual scenarios. References to artists and thinkers including Caspar David Friedrich, John Baldessari, John Cage, Michelangelo Pistoletto, Valie Export, and Erwin Wurm appear throughout her work, forming a layered conversation between past and present artistic practices.

Architecture also plays a role in her exploration of identity and space. Several works engage with the legacy of Finnish architect Alvar Aalto, whose buildings in Wolfsburg connect his influence directly to the region. The exhibition coincides with the 50th anniversary of Aalto’s death in 2026, and related events with the Aalto Society are planned alongside the show.

A citywide collaboration

The exhibition is part of a broader collaboration with halle267 – städtische galerie braunschweig, where a parallel presentation of Angelika Platen’s portraits, Freudensprünge und andere Begegnungen, has also recently opened. That exhibition offers an expanded look at her five-decade engagement with artists, many of whom have ties to Braunschweig through the University of Fine Arts or regional projects. Figures such as Marina Abramović, John Armleder, and Asta Gröting have taught there, while artists including Monica Bonvicini and Daniel Buren have contributed works to local public art initiatives.

Together, the museum and gallery presentations underscore how artists once viewed as controversial avant-garde figures have since become central to the global contemporary art canon — and how Platen’s photographs played a role in shaping their public image. Notably, her close collaborations with many of her subjects often meant she helped stage the photographic moment, sometimes appearing in the images herself.

By pairing Platen’s historically grounded portraits with Brotherus’s reflective, concept-driven works, the Museum für Photographie Braunschweig offers visitors a multifaceted look at portraiture as both documentation and artistic inquiry. The result is an exhibition that moves between past and present, observation and interpretation, and invites viewers to reconsider how artists — and the act of portraying them — shape our understanding of contemporary art.