Vernissage "Rafael Heygster - State of Exception"

In moments of exception, established orders begin to falter. It is in these situations that power becomes visible: expressed through rituals, actions, and events that assert authority, create belonging, and shape perceptions of reality. For more than ten years, Rafael Heygster has photographed such moments. He observes spaces in which power stages itself, seeks to express legitimacy, or is called into question: arms fairs where war is marketed as a consumable experience; a society in the exceptional state of a pandemic, searching for new forms of order; campaign events of a rising far right articulating its claim to power through choreographed self-staging. State of Exception brings together excerpts from three long-term projects: I Died 22 Times (2016-2025), Corona Rhapsody (2020-2022), and Democracy Dies in Daylight (2023-2026). As different as their settings may be, they share a common question: How does power become visible in the 21st century - and what do these images do to us?