Michael Hennings - Shifting Aesthetics

With the exhibition SHIFTING AESTHETICS, the BDA Hamburg explores the aesthetic and conceptual dimensions of transformation within an architectural context. Michael Hennings, whose work emerges at the intersection of art and architectural culture, translates his engagement with existing structures, materials, and spatial perception into a multi-layered, expansive concept.

Building on the architectural conditions of the BDA Gallery, Michael Hennings develops a site-specific installation that combines painting, objects, and space into a cohesive field of experience. Surfaces and color fields respond precisely to the conditions of the existing space, shifting perspectives and opening up new interpretations of what is already there. The wall paintings interweave with the gallery’s surfaces, while translucent films on the storefront dissolve the boundary between the city and the exhibition space. Through this filter of light and color, a shifting dialogue emerges between interior and exterior.

The focus here is not on the act of reshaping, but on precise aesthetic transformation: The existing is reimagined; existing architecture becomes a resonating body for artistic reflection. The result is an exhibition that engages not only formally but also thematically with the current discourse on continued construction, resource conservation, and the perception of space and surface.

Opening: March 26, 2026, 7 p.m.