unterirdisch:LICHT!

»Exhibition, Kaiserslautern / Germany

» Topographies of the Hidden

The exhibition underground:LIGHT! opens up a rock cellar with extensive passages and cavernous spaces. Architectural conditions — darkness, humidity, temperature, acoustics, and the raw texture of walls and floors — decisively shape the environment for both artworks and sound. The participating artists engage with these rare and unusual conditions, developing their works directly from the site.

The Site as Historical Continuum

The exhibition stages the cellar as a palimpsestic continuum, in which the historical traces of its former use as storage and shelter merge with artistic interventions. A carefully composed spatial dramaturgy unfolds as visitors move through the space, where different media coalesce into a choreographed sequence. Transitions between object-based and sound-based works are articulated with precision, without compromising their autonomy.

At its core lies the question of what perception truly responds to. Light traces lines, reveals structures, overlays textures, and shifts spatial relations. Lines of sight and viewing angles emerge with varying intensity, always tied to the moment.

Seeing in Darkness

Within the subterranean context, visual and acoustic processes gain clarity. Darkness concentrates attention on the works themselves: on subtle shifts, on transitions between surface and space, on the interplay of light and shadow. Colour recedes. The space enables a focused mode of seeing, in which structures and relationships gradually unfold. Visibility acquires a temporal dimension, changing and intensifying as one moves through the space.

Participating Artists »

Ingo Bracke
Marion Cziba
Mike Day
Frauke Eckhardt Renate Gross
Katharina Hamp und Dirk Dullmaier
Isabelle Kirsch
Nane Neu
Judith Röder
Klaudia Stoll
Natalie Veken
Sibylle Wagner
Sojeong You

Orientation as Experience

The internal structure of the parcours draws on motifs such as intersection, layering and connection. Linear axes meet networked systems; precisely defined spatial interventions interact with more open visual fields. Sound, technically driven visualisations and freely developed formal relationships coexist. The result is a dense spatial fabric in which perspectives intersect and layers overlap, operating simultaneously across different scales.

With Archaic Force

In this immersive format, the underground space is conceived as a psychologically charged construct. The works relinquish autonomy to become part of a situational interplay of rock, void and light. A heterotopic world emerges, departing from the logic of the white cube and engaging instead with the site’s material presence.

Light functions as both sculptural medium and organising force, establishing orientation through carefully calibrated depth and the articulation of spatial forms. Narrow passages, changes in height and sudden expansions create a direct physical experience, prompting visitors to renegotiate their relationship to space intuitively.

Light in Sedimentary Stone

Within this atmosphere of stillness and resonance, history, architecture and subjective perception condense into an intense, sensory experience. Spatial compression and the use of emptiness encourage reflection, transforming the exhibition into an inward journey.

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Photos and credits:

for all > unterirdisch:LICHT! Felsenkeller unter dem Turnerheim Kaiserslautern
Kunstverein KunstRaum Westpfalz | 750-jähriges Jubiläum der Stadt Kaiserslautern
Kurator: Ingo Bracke | Projektleitung: Birgit Weindl

Termin: 25 April - 28 June 2026 > Rückblick

Adresse: Felsenkeller unter dem Turnerheim, Kaiserslautern

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» Topographies of the Hidden

Participating Artists »

Orientation as Experience

With Archaic Force

Light in Sedimentary Stone

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