GERMAN, 1970
Manuela Karin Knaut’s painterly work reflects the enthusiasm of the artist for travel, the discovery of new terrain and the inevitable leaving of her own comfort zone. The often harsh reality on the streets of Johannesburg, the to German eyes unexpectedly chaotic and disorderly-seeming life in the townships, the colourful variety in the narrow alleys of Accra, the unvarnished, broken walls, the graffiti of the street artists of Brooklyn, the uninhibited, real life and action in the most diverse corners of the world: it is the brokenness, the charmingly imperfect, the frequently temporary-seeming that fascinates Manuela Karin Knaut, and which she imbues into her pictorial language and the primary idea of her location-specific and large format installations.