Open Call: Exhibition White Elephant by KAYA at ICAT | Deadline: December 8, 2026

The sun is still shining and the outdoor pool beckons, but soon the first chocolate Santas will start appearing on supermarket shelves. Quite a few people are already enjoying their first gingerbread package in late summer or early fall. That’s when the first pangs of longing for Christmas traditions start to set in. Why not wrap up a package now for a winter White Elephant exchange?

The two artists and HFBK professors Kerstin Brätsch and Debo Eilers (KAYA) invite you to an artistic White Elephant party. Please bring a signed artwork of yours that you are proud of and you’d like to contribute for the White Elephant exchange. It must be wrapped or crated as a gift and be able to be hung on the wall or ceiling, or be ready to be displayed ad hoc.

After the donated artwork is dropped off at ICAT, the wrapped/crated piece will be installed in the exhibition space. At the “White Elephant” gift exchange on December 16, each person will receive a different gift, which they may unwrap; that gift will then remain on display in the exhibition space until the end of the exhibition in late January 2027.⁠ ⁠Afterward, each gift exchanged can be picked up.

Please register at: anne.meerpohl@hfbk.hamburg.de (also for further questions)

For artists based in Hamburg only.

Procedure

Bring your work: 9.-14.⁠ ⁠December 2026 to HFBK Hamburg / ICAT
White Elephant for participants only: 16 December 2026, 6 p.m.
Opening of the exhibition with all submitted works: tba
Pickup of gifts received: from 25th January 2027 at HFBK Hamburg / ICAT

Application form

Last name

First name

Based in Hamburg?

yes