Scary Good

For the third edition of SUMO, Berlinskej Model hosts Scary Good, a curatorial project by the Berlin-based contemporary art gallery Anton Janizewski and the online magazine gallerytalk.net. There is pain and excitement in creation. As soon as an idea starts manifesting into something that feels too good, one is drawn to distrust the good feeling. More often than not, anticipated greatness reveals itself as trivial rather than extraordinary. While truly remarkable in its abstraction is hard to work toward, coolness is attainable as a composition of codes. Executed with nonchalance, a carefully curated and controlled aesthetic protects one’s true desires. Under the shield of recognition pursuing the promising appears to be less frightening albeit dangerous. The exhibition is both an homage to and a deconstruction of the contemporary cool, toying with clichés of roughness while ultimately neglecting them. Rebekka Benzenberg (DE), Monika Grabuschnigg (AT), Constantin Hartenstein (DE), Eliška Konečná (CZ) and Mary-Audrey Ramirez (LU) draw from fetish and fitness culture, referencing video game creatures, bended bodies, and deadly fruit. Their art and personas merge into what presents as an inviolable surface under which true dedication, doubt, critique, tenderness, and vision are to be discovered. Scary Good is a flirt with the beauty of darkness, taking the world’s wickedness as a starting point to tap into a deeper examination of shared hopes and fears. It allows within the wish for contentment a craving for triumph. On the off chance that scary good feeling might just hold true.