A frequent exercise during driving tests is performing a 180-degree turn in the tightest of spaces, thereby enabling the vehicle to change direction. The interesting thing about this exercise is that, by driving backwards and forwards using different radii, what was once in front of you, such as the distance covered and the area at your side are each considered from a new angle. In their exhibition Three-Point Turn Ines Doleschal, Pauline Kraneis and Susanne Piotter encourage a 360-degree view of a highly topical subject from an artist’s perspective. Traditional means of transport, comprehensive road networks and surface asphalting in urban areas are reflected by the artists in various media. The infrastructure we see today is the result of a one-sided focus on the greatest possible mobility in city and country, which is equated with personal freedom and quality of life.

It’s high time this was revised! For a long time, the three artists have been interested in discrepancies between urban areas and their outskirts. In metropolitan areas designed by people for people, they capture desolate, neglected or off-putting places and buildings that were once synonymous with highly functional urbanity, unlimited mobility and avant-garde urban planning. Using the media of drawing, collage, painting and sculpture, they examine abandoned urban spaces and wastelands and convert the KunstHaus Potsdam into a room for thought and discourse where topics like the dimensions of building projects, delusions of mobility, climate sins and urban quality of life are discussed.

In their work, the artists demand a critical debate with what is depicted or described by paraphrase using a specific aesthetic. For instance, concrete objects entitled Artefacts by Susanne Piotter alternate between the relic, model and ornamental. They are undoubtedly reminiscent of Brutalist style architecture, which was in vogue worldwide from the 1930s onwards. Rough, bizarre constructions or offset pieces as well as the ambiguity of exterior and interior spaces open up new perspectives, associations and possibilities. Their motorway intersections made from concrete on the other hand which, seen from afar, recall the ornamental nature of Gothic cathedrals, appear almost poetical by contrast. Partial views of concrete buildings are also the topic of the Concrete series of paintings by Ines Doleschal. Unaccustomed views of openings, walls, passages and cavities in architectural ensembles leave viewers unsure as to whether these buildings are paintings of utopia or captured reality. In addition the collages of her Berlin South-West series appear like trial arrangements or models of a new modernity wishing to take a stance on this. In her works, Pauline Kraneis plays with two and three-dimensionality, perspectives, and transparencies by translating image material she has come across into her drawings. In so doing the artist frequently takes real spaces and extends them as drawings, thereby putting the architectural balance as well as our perception to the test. In exploring the limits of her own medium, she questions existing architectures and illustrated spaces. Pauline Kraneis will be producing her very own mural for the exhibition. The three artists draw attention to urban infrastructures which have become dubious and, with their exhibition, encourage others to consider how a three-point turn might successfully be performed.

Ines Doleschal (born in Waiblingen in 1972) initially studied Art History and English at the Eberhard Karls University in Tübingen and at Goldsmiths’ College in London, followed by painting at Münster Art Academy as well as Art Education and English at the University of Münster. Later she completed a postgraduate course “Art in Context” at the University of Arts (UdK) Berlin. Doleschal was supported, among others, by a grant from the Berlin Senate in 2020 and was awarded a residency grant from the Landis+Gyr-Foundation in Zug, Künstlerhaus Lukas in Ahrenshoop and the Kunstverein Frankfurt Oder. Her works were recently exhibited, among other places, at the Käthe-Kollwitz-Museum, Biesdorf Place Gallery, at the Projektraum Alte Feuerwache, in the Schwartzsche Villa (all Berlin) as well as in Hamburg at the Nanna Preußner Gallery, Kunstverein Oerlinghausen e.V. and at the Anhaltischer Kunstverein in Dessau. Doleschal lives and works in Berlin and Dessau.

Pauline Kraneis (born in 1970 in London and raised in Stuttgart) studied at the UdK Berlin and at the Glasgow School of Art. She has taught freehand drawing since 2010 as part of the Basic Artistic Theory course at the UdK Berlin since 2010. She also taught at the University of Kassel (Architecture Department) as well as at the Academy of the Fine Arts in Stuttgart (Architecture Department) and was visiting professor in the area of Plastic Art at the BTU Cottbus. Kraneis was awarded, among others, working grants from the State of Berlin and the Stiftung Kunstfonds and awarded the GASAG funding prize. Her works were recently exhibited at the Kollwitzmuseum and at SCOTTY Berlin as well as in the Milli Resürans Sanat Galerisi, Istanbul, as well as, among others, at Arter Istanbul, the Kunstmuseum Bonn, Kupferstichkabinett, Berlin, Museu de Arte Leopoldo Gotuzzo, Pelotas, Brasilien, Museo de Arte del Banco de la República, Bogota, Columbia, Bonner Kunstverein, Kasseler Kunstverein, Lodeveans Collection and the ICA in London, NGBK and Galerie Nord in Berlin. Kraneis lives and works in Berlin and Denmark.

Susanne Piotter (born in Düsseldorf) studied at the Vocational School for Design in Cologne, at the Maastricht Academy of Fine Arts and Design (Diploma in Stage Design) and Multimedia Design at the Media Academy Cimdata, Berlin. Among others, Piotter was awarded a grant by the Kunsthof Barna von Sartory in Brüssow in 2020. Her work has been presented at individual and group exhibitions around the world, latterly for example in Berlin at the Projektraum Alte Feuerwache and in Biesdorf Palace as well as in the Fann A Porter Gallery in Dubai, Arthouse1 in London and the Design Center De Winkelhaak in Antwerp. The artist is represented by BBA Gallery. During the Berlin Gallery Weekend this year, her ‘Artefacts’ were exhibited in an individual exhibition entitled: Trial & error, a concrete method. Piotter lives and works in Berl