Floating Spaces

September 1 - November 7, 2025

Gudrun Kemsa sees her photographs and video installations as an aesthetic extension of everyday perception and thus as an opportunity to rediscover the familiar. Through her photographic work, she opens up unusual perspectives on seemingly everyday scenarios, motivating viewers to reexamine their own viewing habits and sensory impressions.

FLOATING SPACES shows photographic images of familiar places in urban and natural landscapes: luxurious shopping streets, ordinary subway stations, metropolitan buildings, trees, parks and green spaces, forests, and the sea. These otherwise familiar places appear strangely alienating, unrealistically theatrical, exaggeratedly surreal, or blurred, soft-focus, and nebulous in Kemsa's works—almost abstract, thus eluding their usual, easily readable accessibility. In the video installations, the image spaces move contemplatively through space and time, having an immediate decelerating effect on viewers.

Stadtmuseum Siegburg, Markt 45, 53721 Siegburg

CHANGE OF PERSPECTIVE. Women Photographers in Düsseldorf

September 1, 2025 - January 4, 2026

Wednesday, October 29, 2025, at 6 p.m.:
Lecture by Dr. Christoph Danelzik-Brüggemann:
Laura and Isolde. Female photographers in the collection of the City Museum

Sunday, November 8, 2025, and Sunday, November 23, 2025, 3–5 p.m. each day:

Lecture by Prof. Katharina Mayer: Femininity, Photography, Staging

On display are historical positions, students of the Düsseldorf School of Photography, and contemporary female photographers. Various topics are presented and the boundaries of the concept of photography are examined. The exhibition also reflects on the question of female aesthetics.

Due to discrimination and the long-standing lack of recognition of photography as an art form, female photographers often did not receive the attention they deserved in the art world. This exhibition showcases more than a hundred female photographers.

Stadtmuseum Düsseldorf, Berger Allee 2, 40213 Düsseldorf

Photography Symposium URBAN PLACES

Tuesday, November 25, 2025, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Free admission, please register in advance for planning purposes: gudrun.kemsa@hs-niederrhein.de

Cities shape our lives – and photography shapes our image of cities. The URBAN PLACES symposium explores how urban spaces – both gray and green – are represented, interpreted, and questioned in photography. It highlights both documentary and artistic perspectives. The focus is on discussing what insights contemporary artistic photography provides into the relationship between people and cities. Together with the invited curators and teachers, we will reflect on the role photography plays in the perception, criticism, and design of urban spaces—and how our understanding of cities is changed by photographic images.

Speakers

• Prof. Dr. Erik Schmid (“Theories of Design” and Dean of the Design Department, Niederrhein University of Applied Sciences)
• Prof. Nicolas Beucker (“Public & Social Design”, Design Department, Niederrhein University of Applied Sciences)
• Prof. Dr. Robert Fleck (art historian and exhibition curator)
• Stefanie Grebe (Head of the Photographic Collection and Photo Archive, Ruhr Museum, Essen)
• Prof. Paula Markert ("Photography", Faculty of Design, Niederrhein University of Applied Sciences)
• Dr. Linda Conze (Head of the Photography Collection at the Kunstpalast Düsseldorf)
• Stephan Macháč (Coordination Officer for Photography, City of Düsseldorf)
• Dr. Christoph Danelzik-Brüggemann (Head of Collections: 19th Century / Photography Collection, City Museum Düsseldorf)
• Thomas Neumann (Artist, Düsseldorf)
• Thomas Janzen (Education and Outreach, Krefeld Art Museums)

Moderator

Prof. Gudrun Kemsa ("Moving Images and Photography", Department of Design, Niederrhein University of Applied Sciences)

Timeline:

10:00-10:15 a.m.: Welcome: Prof. Dr. Erik Schmid + Prof. Gudrun Kemsa
10:15-10:45 a.m.: Prof. Nicolas Beucker: Public spaces in use
11:00-11:45 a.m.: Prof. Dr. Robert Fleck: The city in art
12:00-12:45 p.m.: Stefanie Grebe: "Emscherbilder" (Emscher Images), a regional photography project – with Prof. Paula Markert
1:00–2:00 p.m.: Lunch in the cafeteria
2:00–3:30 p.m.: Discussion with Dr. Linda Conze, Stephan Macháč and Dr. Christoph Danelzik-Brüggemann
3:30–4:00 p.m.: Thomas Neumann: The oak tree on Schlossplatz in Berlin
4:00–5:00 p.m.: Thomas Janzen: The photographic collection of the Krefeld Art Museums

Niederrhein University of Applied Sciences, Frankenring 20, 47798 Krefeld