Beyond the Gaze

The exhibition Beyond the Gaze by artist Severine Henriette Meier is dedicated to the origins of misogyny and sheds light on central narratives in the history of Western painting. The focus is on Lucas Cranach's painting Adam and Eve, which refers to the biblical story of the Fall of Man. In it, Eve - and by proxy the woman - is made the scapegoat figure of patriarchal narratives by biting into the fruit of the tree of knowledge and depicted as the origin of all evil. The series of works takes up this myth and reinterprets it from a feminist perspective. From the artist's point of view, Eve's bite does not stand for guilt, but for the desire for knowledge and education. This moment of liberation and intellectual self-empowerment becomes a threat to patriarchal structures. Paradise thus becomes a place that is no longer habitable for the liberated. Severine Henriette Meier uses the Western tale of the Fall of Man as a starting point and develops it further in her paintings. Elements of pop art are combined with current socio-political themes: From allusions to the election campaign between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump to symbolic motifs such as a raised fist with long acrylic fingernails reminiscent of a lost paradise. Beyond the Gaze invites visitors to discover this feminist re-reading of a central myth of Western culture and to engage with the question of how deeply embedded narratives shape our understanding of gender and power.