The film still from the Cremaster series shows a blonde woman with pale make-up sitting under a table with a white tablecloth. She is wearing a white negligee with a light-coloured garter belt, has her legs spread out in front of her and covers her crotch, but looks challengingly towards the camera. Dark grapes are arranged in front of her as a symbol. Matthew Barney, Sammlung Goetz Munich

HFF Munich

Matthew Barney: CREMASTER Cycle

June 3 – June 5, 2014

In his five-part CREMASTER Cycle, Matthew Barney takes the viewer on a long journey featuring fairytale-like imagery. He produced these films – and the corresponding display cases – between 1994 and 2002, not in numerical order, however. The CREMASTER Cycle is the American artist's most famous work. In it, he processes historical events, myths, sagas and personal memories into intoxicating sequences of images.

The title refers to the cremaster muscle, which is responsible for raising and lowering the testes. This action is not controlled voluntarily, but influenced by external stimuli. Barney's films deal with questions of biological and psychological processes of creation. Beginning with his experiences as an athlete, he pursues the idea that something can only take on form when confronted by resistance.

The screening of the five-part CREMASTER Cycle is a joint project between Academy of Fine Arts in Munich, Haus der Kunst, HFF Munich and Sammlung Goetz. This side event on the occasion of the exhibition Matthew Barney: River of Fundament in Haus der Kunst was organized by the class of Olaf Nicolai at the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich and will be held at HFF Munich.

Program:

Matthew Barney: CREMASTER 1-5

Audimax of HFF Munich
Bernd-Eichinger-Platz 1, 80333 Munich

Tuesday, 6/3/2014, 7:00 p.m.
Welcome: Nora Ahrens (HFF Munich), Jonas Münch (Academy of Fine Arts Munich, the Olaf Nicolai class), Dr. Cornelia Gockel (Sammlung Goetz)
CREMASTER 4, 1994/95, 42'
CREMASTER 1, 1995/96, 42' 40''

Wednesday 6/4/2014, 7:00 p.m.
Introduction: Dr. Thomas Girst, Munich
CREMASTER 5, 1997, 54' 30''
CREMASTER 2, 1999, 79'

Thursday 6/5/2014, 7:00 p.m.
Introduction: Dr. Eva Wruck, Bochum
CREMASTER 3, 2002, 181' 59''

Cyrill Lachauer. The Sunset Route

June 20 – September 27, 2026 | Kunstpalais Erlangen

feat. Mike Brodie, Mouse Green, Rhyw, Mia Justice Smith, Moritz Stumm

In the exhibition The Sunset Route, on view at the Kunstpalais Erlangen and created in collaboration with the Sammlung Goetz, Cyrill Lachauer presents works from 2020 to 2025, a period during which he traveled on freight trains through the USA, Mexico, and Bosnia. In the spirit of poetic ethnography, he created photographs and films that are now being shown together for the first time. They all explore questions of freedom, self-determination, and resistance, as well as colonization, exclusion, and exploitation.

Laurie Simmons. Dollhouse Photographs

June 25 – August 30, 2026 | Deutsches Theatermuseum

The American artist Laurie Simmons is known for her photographs featuring tiny dolls representing stereotypical female roles in domestic interiors. The exhibition, a collaboration between Sammlung Goetz, Deutsches Theatermuseum and Filmfest Munich, presents a selection of works by Simmons that cast a critical gaze at gender stereotypes in the American middle class.

Sterling Ruby

July 16 – October 24, 2026 | Sammlung Goetz /Schaufenster

Los Angeles-based American artist Sterling Ruby is known for his cross-genre work, which ranges from ceramics and bronzes, collages and textiles, to enormous, spray-painted paintings. In his works, Ruby weaves together a variety of different autobiographical, art-historical, and sociological sources. Through deconstruction and reconstruction, he probes the idea of a non-hierarchical and borderless universe. The exhibition at the Sammlung Goetz /Schaufenster provides insight into his multi-layered artistic practice.

Jeff Wall

November 17, 2026 – February 20, 2027 | Sammlung Goetz /Schaufenster

Canadian artist Jeff Wall is one of the most influential photographers of our time. In his elaborately staged pictorial compositions, he combines the narrative of cinema with painting. Wall became known for his large-format lightbox images, which are formally more reminiscent of the world of advertising than that of fine art. With this technique, he revolutionized the medium of photography, elevating it to the height of painting and sculpture. The exhibition at the Sammlung Goetz /Schaufenster presents a selection of his iconic lightbox images from the 1990s.