It's Easy to Believe

Luki von der Gracht

25.03.2021—20.04.2021

Eisenbahnstr. 141a, Leipzig

I like to believe that belief is extremely present in current times.
However less religiously situated, many people are desperately searching for someone or something to trust in –– looking for entities that reflect us, connect us and validate our experience.
Does it become gradually harder to believe when you are indulged in education and wealth? Or is it quite the contrary?
When do I believe in myself?
And when in others?
You have got to believe. In yourself, in god, in something. That’s what they say. But who is speaking?

Is belief unavoidably always a reflection of things that we are made to believe, things we consume and absorb? That quickly evokes another question; Is believing inherently connected to political and media landscapes? In a world where nothing has to be completely rationally justified, belief systems, in a post-factual manner, radically construct reality.

Luki von der Gracht’s artistic work is genre-bending and includes written and spoken word, collage, performance, photography, drawing, video and installation. In the centre of Luki von der Gracht’s artistic research stands the human being with it’s past, present and future. It’s imagination, emotions and purpose. A big part of their work is the search for a safe space, a family, an identity, perspectives and possibilities. How do you find this place, build it up and protect it? Who discriminates against who? How can we question and break through society’s power structures? Who is invisible? Who makes the rules? What is the power of the artistic gesture? In the form of a poem, a protest and hope.

In their solo exhibition at Fonda, Luki digs deeper into questions of representation, selecting processes of identification as an overarching theme. We find see-through stools filled with magazine and newspaper articles about trans* identity told by the mass media. The articles which all comment on gender roles, crossdressing, coming out stories and other sensational news meet digitally altered images of one of Luki’s childhood idols on the one side, as well as a single drawing on the other. Diving into private and public realms alike, It’s Easy To Believe ultimately establishes a trajectory that maps personal as well as societal desires.

Photo Documentation by Alexandra Ivanciu

Luki Von Der Gracht

Luki Von Der Gracht has studied at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf with Rita McBride, Trisha Donnelly and graduated with a honorary Meisterschüler-Diploma in the class of Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster in 2020. Luki was a stipend resident of Cité International des Arts Paris in 2018 and was awarded the stipend for excellent students of Kunstakademie Düsseldorf by Kunstverein für die Rheinlande und Westfalen in 2017. In 2020 they have been awarded with the NRW Bank Kunstpreis. For their installation Coming To Voice in the identically named Graduates exhibition at K21 Kunstsammlung NRW they have received the Von Rundstedt Förderstipendium in 2021. The musical project Die Hässlichen Vögel (The Ugly Birds) was last invited to the performance programme Disappearing Berlin at Schinkel Pavillon Berlin, the Institute Of Contemporary Arts (ICA) in London and Berghain Berlin.

"I believe in you and me", 2016, ink on paper

"Trans* Cubes (Tower Version)", 2021, plexiglass, printed newspaper articles

"Show (Three Parts)", 2021, inkjet-print on archival photo paper, aluminium dibond