In the artworks he created specifically for this exhibition, Thomas Kilpper explored the diverse social aspects surrounding the theme of water. Due to the enormous growth of the world’s population, the privatization of drinking water sources, and climate change, the demand for water has risen dramatically over the past half-century. Global shortages are growing, and conflicts over water resources are becoming increasingly frequent. Thomas Kilpper, born in Stuttgart in 1956 and now living in Berlin, works primarily in site-specific installations using a wide range of media: installation, sculpture, printmaking, photography, and video.

 He has gained international renown for repurposing the floors of mostly vacant buildings into large-format printing blocks and installations, such as in 1998 with the work “Don’t Look Back” in the former basketball hall at Camp King in Oberursel, or in 2009 with his exhibition “State of Control” in the former Ministry for State Security of the GDR in Berlin. In the exhibition “Water on Fire / Brennendes Wasser,” the immense power of the woodblock prints from Kilpper’s series “Atlantic Footprints” (2017) met a new series of woodcuts and comparatively fragile watercolor drawings that complemented the theme.

They addressed both historical and current events in the context of water: from the floods in Wiesbaden (1955) to the Ahr Valley (2021) or Hurricane Katrina (2005), up to the largely unknown water attack on then-Federal President Lübke (1968). Kilpper visually translated current questions regarding water as a resource of conflict into the exhibition space, thereby capturing the fundamental problems that have long been virulent. Water on Fire / Burning Water was created in collaboration with Kaj Osteroth and Xiaopeng Zhou and was curated by Dr. Miya Yoshida.
As part of Wiesbaden’s Year of Water 2022