2023
My artistic practice has evolved in recent years into a relational work between the human and the more-than-human-world. Fungi and their ecology of connectedness are inspiration, orientation and co-authors for my relational work.
I learn from fungi how to survive in the ruins and waste of the capitalist economy and in precarious living conditions. It is about practices of coexistence, kinship, and connectedness. It is about intra-action through and with bodies of significant otherness. It is about practices of contamination and healing and about collaboration as symbiont and saprobiont.
The alien nature and non-human intelligence of fungi fascinate me. They remind me that we are part of one and the same umwelt. They challenge me to unlearn things and leave them to the other-than-human-world.
My artworks are often relational practices themselves, situated, transdisciplinary and participatory. Speculative fictional stories and other works emerge during research, rehearsal and care processes. They are less objects of representation/illustration or documents of knowledge than enablers and companions of the relational work.
Exhibitions
Her work was presented in institutions, galleries and festivals in Germany, Italy, France and the US, amongst: Galeria Hybrida Contemporanea, Rome (2009) (S); Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin (2010); Museo Laboratorio di Arte Contemporanea, Rome (2011); Gallery Karin Wimmer Contemporary Art, Munich (2015) (S); Underdox/Videodox Festival (2015); Festival Kino der Kunst in corporation with gallery Karin Wimmer (2017) (S); Jahresgaben Kunstverein München (2010-2017); Kunstraum München, Munich (2018) (S); Gallery Boutwell/Schabrowsky, Munich (2022) (S).
(S) = solo exhibition
Lectures & Residencies
In 2019, she received the WimmelResearch-Fellowship from Akademie Schloss Solitude in cooperation with Bosch GmbH Center for Research and Advance Engineering, Renningen/ Germany. She lectured on: „NeuroAlchemie – How a Neural Network Sees the World“, KIT Karlsruhe (2020); „Visualisation of Data in the Arts and Economics“, Kunstraum München (2019); “Introduction in Artistic Practice”, echolot, Kunstverein Stuttgart (2017); “10. Nov. ’38 – Data Leak of a Nazi-Crime“, Auditorio Maestre Pie Filippini Rome (2016); „Strategic Art?“ – Symposium, Universität der Künste Berlin (2012).
Collaborations
She carried out her artistic research on “Digital Nature” in collaboration with video artist Johannes Evers and cofounded with him the performance group “Professionelle Öffnungszeiten” (2013-2015). From 2020-2021 she was a member of the transdisciplinary research group “Non/Post-Human Ecosystems of Knowledge”, initiated by biophysicist and curator Aouefa Amoussouvi. In 2021 she cofounded the art and science group “Transfungal Ensemblage” with herbalist and fashion theorist Katrin Seiler. From 2023 on she co-invites to experimental reading sessions on new materialism.
Education
Christina Maria Pfeifer completed a multidisciplinary education in Germany, France, Italy and Austria. She graduated in political economy, studied Romance languages and culture in Paris and Florence, and attended Andrea Fogli’s drawing class and Klaus vom Bruch’s multimedia class at the International Summer Academy in Salzburg. Attracted and inspired by Japanese culture, she attended various courses in Butoh dance. She worked as a researcher and earned an interdisciplinary PhD in the social sciences. She was a member of the board of a small think tank and software house developing tools for complex decision-making processes in politics and industry.