Pop on the Rhine

The Rhineland has launched a significant number of pop cultural trends in music, literature and the fine arts since the 1960s. Bands such as Can from Cologne or Kraftwerk from Düsseldorf have set international standards, while writers like Rolf Dieter Brinkmann have had a formative influence on literature with anti-literary provocation and comics-style aesthetics. In the 1990s, a dynamic live literature scene established itself in the Rhineland resulting in new event formats such as poetry slams and spoken-word events. And at the same time, a new and multi-faceted electronic music scene evolved which produced outstanding musical artists such as the electro-pop group Mouse on Mars and the music label A-Musik. The exhibition Pop on the Rhine and its accompanying programme presented pop culture, not as a global phenomenon, but as a regional culture with examples from the fields of literature, pop music, club culture, fine arts, film, advertising and design.

Curators: Uwe Husslein, Enno Stahl
Participants / artists: Jörg Burger, Can, Heinz Edelmann, Peter Glaser, Rolf Ulrich Kaiser, Thomas Kling, Kraftwerk, Mouse on Mars, Mülheimer Freiheit, Exit Gruppe (Thomas Hornemann, Henning John von Freyend), Markus Oehlen, X-Screen, Charles Paul Wilp and others