GERHARD HOEHME & DELIA JÜRGENS. Like Wolves on the Fold

15 November 2025 to 24 January 2026 ⟶ Galerie

Installation view. Photo: Angelina Kalachenkova

Delia Jürgens, Is it me or you #2, 2016/17 / 2021 / 2025, pigmented inkjet print of video still of digital painting „is it me or you“ interlaced with photo of painting „Offline [Display IV. Stream] on on paper on glass, dye-sublimation print of „something is“ on shirt of 100% cotton, dye-sublimation print of „spinning portals“ on shirt of 100% cotton, energy shot, chop sticks, plastic bag, inscense, sand from Santa Monica Beach Los Angeles, 150 x 200 cm, (detail). Photo: Angelina Kalachenkova

Installation view. Photo: Angelina Kalachenkova

Left: Delia Jürgens, Blank Space , 2016-2017 / 2025, Cotton on stretcher bar on cotton, rocks from Leo Carillo beach in Malibu Los Angeles, 115 x 60 cm
Right: Delia Jürgens, All this I do for Glory, 2016-2017 / 2021 / 2025

Pigmented inkjet print of video still of digital painting „is it me or you“ on plastic foil imprint in plaster on cotton on stretcher bar; rocks from Leo Carillo beach in Malibu Los Angeles, 115 x 60 cm. Photo: Angelina Kalachenkova

Delia Jürgens, Between Water and Wind #1, 2016-2017 / 2021,

Lacquer and acrylic paint on pigmented inkjet print of screen interference on transparent paper interlaced with pigmented inkjet print of printing error of video still of digital painting „is it me or you“ on paper on MDF, aluminum, 40 × 23 × 3 cm, Photo: Angelina Kalachenkova

Delia Jürgens, Between Water and Wind #1 , 2016-2017 / 2021, Lacquer and acrylic paint on pigmented inkjet print of screen interference on transparent paper interlaced with pigmented inkjet print of printing error of video still of digital painting „is it me or you“ on paper on MDF, aluminum, two parted, together 40 x 23 cm (detail). Photo: Angelina Kalachenkova

Installation view. Photo: Angelina Kalachenkova

Gerhard Hoehme, durchpulst und umpaust (durchblutet und umpaust), 1986, Acrylic paint on canvas, PE strings, 240 x 140 cm. Photo: Katrin Rother

Delia Jürgens, With the dark hug of Time , 2016-2017 , pigmented inkjet print of video still of digital painting „is it me or you“ and paint on plastic foil imprint in concrete on linen on stretcher bar, moth, rocks and soil from ancient Santa Monica dune, 65 x 35 cm. Photo: Angelina Kalachenkova

Installation view. Photo: Angelina Kalachenkova

Delia Jürgens, Like Wolves on the Fold, 2016-2017, Lacquer and acrylic paint on paper on pigmented inkjet print of inverted forest and Stock-image of pedestrian on cotton on stretcher bar, 70 x 40 cm, Photo: Angelina Kalachenkova

Installation view. Photo: Angelina Kalachenkova

Delia Jürgens, CV(DH - Python), 2018, Pigmented inkjet print of deconstructed Stock Image of mineralized rock on transfer film on surface of sleeping bag, 2 acrylic glass sheets, 185 × 120 cm, Photo: Angelina Kalachenkova

Gerhard Hoehme, Feuergott, 1982, Acrylic paint on canvas, PE cords, 160 x 120 cm

Installation view. Photo: Angelina Kalachenkova

Delia Jürgens, in and of itself #1, 2016-2017 / 2025, Plastic foil imprint in colored wallpaper paste on ripped pigmented inkjet print of video still of digital painting „is it me or you“ on cotton on stretcher bar, two parts, total 87 x 54,4 cm. Photo: Angelina Kalachenkova

Delia Jürgens, CX (DH – Navigation), 2018, Oil paint on pigmented inkjet print of deconstructed Stock Image of mineralized rock on transfer film on surface of sleeping bag, cracked phone, hair tie, compass keychain, 2 glass sheets, 185 x 120 cm (variable). Photo: Angelina Kalachenkova

Delia Jürgens, Flügelnacht, 2025, liquid chalk marker on black mirror, 75,5 x 75,5 cm. Poem by Paul Celan. Photo: Angelina Kalachenkova

Gerhard Hoehme, Bedrohliche Schatten, 1963/65, Oil on canvas , 160 x 140 cm. Photo: Katrin Rother

Installation view. Photo: Angelina Kalachenkova

Gerhard Hoehme, mori mori, 1985, Acrylic paint, canvas, PVC sensor , 240 x 120 cm. Photo: Ricky Thieler

Delia Jürgens, Between Water and Wind #2, 2016-2017 , Plastic foil imprint in concrete, aluminum, 34 x 26 cm. Photo: Angelina Kalachenkova

Installation view. Photo: Angelina Kalachenkova

Delia Jürgens, is it me or you #1-1, 2016, pigmented inkjet print of video still of digital painting „is it me or you“ on paper in aluminum frame, 21 x 29,7 cm

Gerhard Hoehme, Damast mit Schattenstuhl, 1968, Acrylic paint on damask, nylon cords, Ca. 180 x 150 cm

Installation view. Photo: Angelina Kalachenkova

Delia Jürgens, To see more light, 2016-2017 / 2021, pigmented ink imprint of video still of digital painting „is it me or you“ and paint on plastic foil imprint in plaster on linen on stretcher bar, 70 x 40 cm. Photo: Angelina Kalachenkova

Gerhard Hoehme, Das Peitschenbild, 1977, Acrylic paint on wood, PE cords, photograph, ca. 190 x 200 cm. Photo: Katrin Rother

Installation view. Photo: Angelina Kalachenkova

Delia Jürgens, Untitled (Sky - petrified woods), [WORTAUFSCHÜTTUNG], 2016 / 2025, liquid chalk marker on glass, paper, linoleum tiles, 108 x 182,5 cm. Poem by Paul Celan. Photo: Angelina Kalachenkova

Installation view. Photo: Angelina Kalachenkova

Delia Jürgens, Words , 2016-2017 , charcoal on concrete on pigmented inkjet print of Stock-image of soil interlaced with Stock-image of pedestrian on paper on plastic foil imprint in concrete on cotton on stretcher bar, 70 x 40 cm. Photo: Angelina Kalachenkova

Installation view. Photo: Angelina Kalachenkova

Delia Jürgens, Is it me or you #2, 2016/2017 / 2021 / 2025, Pigmented inkjet print of video still of digital painting „is it me or you“ interlaced with photo of painting „Offline [Display IV. Stream] on on paper on glass, dye-sublimation print of „something is“ on shirt of 100% cotton, dye-sublimation print of „spinning portals“ on shirt of 100% cotton, energy shot, chop sticks, plastic bag, inscense, sand from Santa Monica Beach Los Angeles, 150 x 200 cm, Photo: Angelina Kalachenkova

Gerhard Hoehme, Cock-Head der Erich, 1968, acrylic paint on canvas, mirror, 160 x 80 cm. Photo: Angelina Kalachenkova

Delia Jürgens, In and of itself #2, 2016 / 2025, Plaster on plastic foil imprint in concrete on cotton on stretcher bar, plastic foil imprint in concrete on cotton on stretcher bar, cotton on stretcher bar

160 x 140 cm, Photo: Angelina Kalachenkova

Delia Jürgens, Spindrift , 2016-2017 / 2021, Graphite on pigmented inkjet print of Stock-image of marble interlaced with google earth supervision of mountains on paper on MDF, 70 x 40 cm. Photo: Angelina Kalachenkova

OPENING
Friday, November 14, 6 - 9 pm

ARTIST TALK
with Delia Jürgens
Saturday, November 15 at 2 pm

At the intersection of two generations, the exhibition "Like Wolves on the Fold" presents the works of Gerhard Hoehme, a key figure of post-war German Informel, and Delia Jürgens, a young artist who explores questions of contemporary painting in the information age.

In her second exhibition at Galerie Nothelfer, entitled “Like Wolves on the Fold,” artist Delia Jürgens, who lives in Hanover and Los Angeles, presents new installations, materializations, objects, photographs, poems, and excerpts from her studio diaries.

In her works, she combines industrial materials such as inkjet prints, including video stills of digital paintings, Google Earth images of mountains on paper on MDF, plastic tarpaulins, sleeping bags, concrete, linoleum tiles, and mirror fragments with natural materials such as sand, stones, and beach finds from Malibu and Santa Monica. This creates material transitions between nature and artificiality. These layers contain inscriptions—such as traces of liquids, waves, folds, and residues—that connect the everyday with transience, urbanity, and landscape. At the same time, she addresses social contexts, as seen in her black-and-white photographs of homeless tents against the Los Angeles skyline from the series (Fragmented Landscape) “Facades: A morning full of Dust, you're half inside and half Way out” (2016–2017).

Objects such as broken cell phones also refer to this, as does the disappearance of 99-cent stores in the USA, from which cheap products such as a compass key ring, an energy shot, a hair tie, incense sticks, and chopsticks originate in the installations.

In dialogue

Jürgen's complex installations enter into a multi-layered dialogue with works by Gerhard Hoehme from the 1960s to the 1980s, a central representative of German Informel. Hoehme's innovative materials include PE cords, some of which reach down to the floor, as in “Peitschenbild” (1977), with acrylic paint on canvas. Since the 1950s, the artist has been using seemingly banal industrial products as an artistic means of dissolving the traditional boundaries of panel painting and expanding the pictorial space into the physical space of the viewer. The cords protruding from the canvas function as sculptural elements that transform the two-dimensional painting into a three-dimensional space of experience. At the same time, they take on a structural function: they appear as a material continuation of the painted lines, creating a rhythmic and dynamic intertwining of surface and space that simultaneously seeks direct dialogue with the viewer.

This thinking is philosophically grounded in Heraclitus' idea of constant flux and the interconnectedness of all things. When Hoehme describes the string in his 1967 manifesto “Relationships” as a “plastic form of Heraclitean thinking”, he interprets it as a symbol of permanent transformation and relational unity. The PE string is thus not merely a material, but a medium of a metaphysical principle: it opens up the image to a field of living relationships between matter, space, movement, and the viewer.

Pairings and condensations

The exhibition title “Like Wolves on the Fold” refers to a composition of the same name by avant-garde saxophonist Colin Stetson and is also the source of inspiration and title for a work by Jürgens.

The dense, pulsating layers of sound in this piece of music impressively reflect the atmospheric dimension in which the works of Jürgens and Hoehme enter into a multi-layered dialogue with each other. The exhibits are mostly placed in deliberate proximity to one another, resulting in condensations through pairings and fields of tension.

The space between them functions both as a gap and a fold, separating the works in their differentiation, but also connecting them.

Exterior_Day and Night

The exhibition is divided into two sections: “Night”, featuring dark and bold color works such as Hoehme's “Bedrohliche Schatten” (Threatening Shadows, 1963), “Feuergott” (Fire God, 1982) and “mori mori” (1985), as well as works by Jürgens, “in and of itself #1” (2016–2017), two sleeping bag installations, and a materialization of Paul Celan's poem “Flügelnacht” (Wing Night) (2016–2017), which represent night and the unconscious.

In the “Day” section, works by Hoehme such as “Cock-Head der Erich” (1968) and Jürgens' “in and of itself #2” (2016–2017) form a counterpart. This section is complemented by concrete works by Jürgens such as “Like Wolves on the Fold” (2016–2017), “With the dark hug of Time” (2016–2017), ‘Spindrift’ (2016–2017), and “In and of itself #5” (2016–2017).

The division into day and night areas opens up a dual perspective that negotiates the binary concept of day and night both on a material level (light, color, surface) and on a spiritual level (knowledge, transcendence). Hoehme depicts daylight in his works as a visible, living presence, expressed through materials such as colored PE plastic cords and shadow discolorations on fabrics, for example in the work “Damast mit Schattenstuhl” (1967).

In her contemporary works, Jürgens addresses the duality of visibility and concealment through the superimposition of translucent and opaque materials.Referring to Novalis, whom Delia Jürgens quotes in relation to the exhibition's day/night concept, day is regarded as a state of sensually perceptible presence in which light is understood as a medium of visibility—just as sunlight illuminates concrete—and a metaphor for consciousness. Night, on the other hand, is understood as a sphere of inwardness and spiritualization, which in external perception merges into an intuition of the invisible. The idea formulated by Novalis—darkness as a source of light—forms a central point of reference here.

This tension between day and night is reflected in the exhibition as a dialogue between the works as well as between generations of artists, between Informel and contemporary art.

Inner_ Three poems by Paul Celan

Three poems by Paul Celan (1920–1970) form a connecting element in the exhibition. Jürgens selected the poems “Flügelnacht” (Winged Night, 1954/55), “Wortaufschüttung” (ca. 1963) and ‘Angewintertes’ (late 1960s) from Hoehme's catalog “Gerhard Hoehme Bilder – Objekte. Paul Celan Gedichte” (1986). The artist materializes these by placing handwritten notations of the poems on glass.

Jürgens' artistic strategies are characterized by the layering of different materials, which are deliberately superimposed on each other to create new, multi-layered levels of reality.

The translucency of these layers, for example in the form of air pockets or transparent materials, creates an auratic depth that points beyond the visible. The temporary wrapping of works in plastic creates reflective surfaces that reveal the interlocking of materials and their reflection. In addition, she compresses, stretches, condenses, and expands her materials and formats, integrating their variability as an artistic strategy: the work “With the dark hug of Time” (2016-1017), for example, is a compression of the original work that was shown at the Kestnergesellschaft and the ZKM.

This practice engages in a productive exchange with the work of Gerhard Hoehme, whose oeuvre is also characterized by layers of material, creating spatial depth and complex surface structures. Hoehme's artistic engagement with Paul Celan's poetry reflects linguistically similar processes of layering and inscribing meaning.

Thus, Jürgens, Hoehme, and Celan share an aesthetic of multilayeredness in which the visible and the invisible, the material and the imaginary enter into a complex interplay.

The visual conciseness and existential depth of Paul Celan's poetry are reflected in both Jürgens' and Hoehme's artistic practice, which deal with themes such as transience, fragmentation, condensation, stretching, new beginnings, and nomadic existence in various media forms.

Natural space – urban space_psychological resonance space

Many of Jürgens' works were created in the immediate vicinity of downtown Los Angeles, a place where traces of life and decay are visible on the streets.

The view from the studio window in LA is just as present here as the dusty, the floating – the dissolving between inside and outside. Architectural fragments, surfaces, and atmospheric layers merge into a poetic reflection on the relationship between visibility, absence, and memory.

The artist often uses the motif of the forest as a symbol of untouched nature, but also as a space of transition in which decay is inextricably linked to renewal. In this sense, the forest appears not only as a natural space, but also as a psychological resonance chamber: a symbol of the unconscious and of an inward movement. The cycle of becoming and passing away, growth and dissolution connects the symbols of forest and urban landscape into a common semantic space—between fragment and continuity, between material trace and inner experience.

Delia Jürgens and Gerhard Hoehme share a common interest in the experimental use of industrial materials to expand artistic media. Both integrate artificial materials to break with traditional two-dimensionality and incorporate space and interaction with the viewer. Hoehme's use of PE cords symbolizes Heraclitean principles of flow and relationship, while Jürgens uses materials such as digital elements to merge physical and virtual realities. Together, they use their materials to reflect on change, interconnectedness, and an expanded visual world.

A poetry collection by Delia Jürgens and excerpts from her studio diary are on display at the exhibition.

Delia Jürgens, born in Hanover in 1986, is a German painter and installation artist who lives between Hanover and Los Angeles. In 2018, she received the prestigious Sprengel Prize for Fine Arts from the Lower Saxony Savings Bank Foundation. Her most important exhibitions include presentations at the Sprengel Museum Hannover, ZKM Karlsruhe, Kestner Gesellschaft Hannover, and international exhibitions in Los Angeles and Vienna. She also received working scholarships from the State of Lower Saxony (2016) and the Kunstfonds Foundation (2019), as well as the Neustart Kultur – Innovative Art Projects project scholarship from the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media (2022).

Gerhard Hoehme (1920–1989) was an important representative of German Informel. His most important awards include the Villa Massimo Prize in Rome (1960), the Marzotto Prize for European Painting in Vicenza (1962), and the Förderpreis des Landes Nordrhein-Westfalen (1957). He exhibited his works at documenta II in Kassel (1959), among other venues, and had major exhibitions at the Museum Küppersmühle in Duisburg and the Museum Kunstpalast Düsseldorf, among others. As a professor at the Düsseldorf Art Academy, he had a decisive influence on numerous students and the development of postwar abstract art in Germany.

(Text: Heike Fuhlbrügge)