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Exhibition
Fake it till you make it
Di. – Fr., 14:00–18:00 Uhr ICAT der HFBK Hamburg, Raum 02
Artists: Phuong Bui, Trieu Dao, Sina Eichhorst, Luzie Ana Catalina Katzorke, Willi Mend, Emiliano Mondragón, Josie Overton, Sude Nur Tosun, UWAGA2002 (Nika Genetika & Ella Kur & Alfons Nagel), Leonie Wahler, Aleit Wagenbrenner
Opening: April 16, 6 p.m. With a performance by UWAGA2002 (Nika Genetika & Ella Kur & Alfons Nagel)
Closing: May 3, 2026, 3 p.m. With a performance by the Working Class Daughters and a reading by Daniela Aparicio Ugalde
Time and again, the image of the precarious life of an artist collides with real economic conditions: for some, a phase of life marked by deprivation as a voluntarily chosen creative sacrifice; for others, a structural inequality that leaves little time and few resources for artistic work. This gives rise to ambivalence, irritation, and friction. A wide variety of starting conditions shape artistic processes, their perspectives, and aesthetic questions.
The term “classism” describes various forms of exclusion, devaluation, and inequality based on social background, economic conditions, or group affiliation. In the art and cultural sectors, these are particularly shaped by performance, habitus, the embodiment of patterns of action, and seemingly invisible codes, accompanied by feelings such as shame, anger, or insecurity. What might processes of appropriation, masking, and strategies for navigating a glass ceiling look like if they also addressed aesthetic concerns? What artistic means can make conditions of access or interpersonal solidarity visible, and reflectively interrogate social background in its various forms?
The exhibition Fake it till you make it at ICAT, Room 2, in April 2026 aims to examine the starting conditions of an artistic engagement, its visualization, and its aesthetics through artistic positions emerging from an open call. Fake it till you make it is part of the decentralized festival “Klassenreise – Aktionen zu sozialer Herkunft” (Class Trip – Actions on Social Background), featuring additional program events and venues in Hamburg in April and May 2026.