Albert Merz - "INTRO": A ritual between dream, archetype and present

With his current solo exhibition INTRO  at the AK Gallery in Berlin, Albert Merz ( born 1942 in Unterägeri ) once again explores a path between symbolic imagery and inner exploration. What can visitors expect? A work that cannot simply be interpreted as painting or sculpture, but rather as an attempt to penetrate the boundary between the conscious and the unconscious – and thus an invitation to discover oneself.

Between symbol and sensuality

Merz's works bear witness to a long artistic development: Active in Berlin since the 1980s, he has cultivated a complex, personal vocabulary of symbols and archetypes, characterized by figurative allusions as well as abstract forms. In INTRO , these elements are explored more intensely than ever before. Every line, every surface appears as deliberately placed as it does intuitively created. The contrasts—order and chaos, the visible and the invisible—are not contradictions, but rather part of a whole that Merz unites with meditative calm and cool precision.

Memory, myth, origin

A central theme of the exhibition is memory – not as a nostalgic look back, but as the fundamental tone of human existence. His paintings create scenes that evoke moments of déjà vu. One feels as if one is seeing something long familiar, a primal dream, the premature birth of a myth, or the very birth of the world itself. Merz develops these feelings in compositions where myth and the present overlap, where memory acts as a dynamic force.

The sculptures in the exhibition bring these inner images to life. They anchor the symbol in space, matter, and shadow – and make it palpable that the origin is never detached from the present. Form and material react, opening up space for imagination without relying solely on narrative.

A look into the depths

Merz's theoretical background in art, particularly Jungian psychoanalysis, is palpable – not as a scholarly footnote, but as a fundamental attitude: a deep trust that something collectively unifying can be found in the archetypal, something that concerns all of humanity. His interplay with signs, forms, and geometric spaces aims not at speculation, but at experience – at that which one can see, feel, but not necessarily name.

Special features of INTRO

• New paintings & sculptures – works that demonstrate Merz's long-term vision; mature, focused, and confident.
• Pictorial spaces with symbolic density – each work contains a grammar of signs that cannot be deciphered immediately, but can be experienced.
• A dialogical use of media – painting and sculpture speak to each other, each distinct, yet part of a common space.

Invitation

INTRO is not a silent experience, but neither is it a spectacle. It is an invitation to take time, to pause – before a painting, before a sculpture, and before oneself. The exhibition opens spaces where sensitivity, dreams, and archetypes intertwine – and where the primal and inexplicable become visible.

Albert Merz – INTRO
AK Gallery Berlin
October 12 – November 13, 2025
Opening: October 11, 2025, 4–7 pm