Seriously.
Curated by Nana Bahlmann
November 21, 2025–January 31, 2026
London

Monika Sprüth and Philomene Magers are pleased to present Seriously., a group exhibition curated by Nana Bahlmann, featuring over a hundred conceptual photographs, print media, and select films ranging from the 1960s to the present, which expose the absurdities of our world and its representations. Through visual wit, subversiveness, and even outright slapstick, these photographic experiments offer humorous conceptual investigations of how images are constructed and interpreted. Employing a range of strategies, from masquerade and role-play to the construction of inexplicable scenarios, unexpected juxtapositions, and idiosyncratic sculptural compositions, these works reveal the farcical and fantastical within the visual realm. In reframing our visual world through satire and playful mimicry, they create space for both reflection and amusement.

Seriously. features the work of, among others, Keith Arnatt, John Baldessari, Bernd and Hilla Becher, Lynda Benglis, Helen Chadwick, Robert Cumming, Thomas Demand, Philip-Lorca diCorcia, Braco Dimitrijević, Peter Fischli and David Weiss, Tom Friedman, Dan Graham, Rodney Graham, Scott Grieger, Aneta Grzeszykowska, Sigurður Guðmundsson, Andreas Gursky, Barbara Hammer, Rebecca Horn, Douglas Huebler, Astrid Klein, David Lamelas, Louise Lawler, Tom Marioni, Anthony McCall, Jonathan Monk, Peter Moore, Bruce Nauman, Dennis Oppenheim, Charles Ray, Andrea Robbins and Max Becher, Thomas Ruff, Ed Ruscha, Cindy Sherman, Stephen Shore, Santiago Sierra and Franz Erhard Walther, Roman Signer, Laurie Simmons, Robert Therrien, Rosemarie Trockel, Keiji Uematsu, Ger van Elk, John Waters, William Wegman, and Hannah Wilke.

John Waters
Hollywood's Greatest Hits
February 16–May 8, 2021
Los Angeles

Hollywood’s Greatest Hits features a selection of works, most of which have never been seen before in LA, that shed light on John Waters' decades-long, wide-ranging art practice, and in particular, his humorous and irreverent takes on the movie industry.

John Waters
Beverly Hills John
July 1–August 15, 2015
London

John Waters' first ever exhibition in London, Beverly Hills John, is a fresh set of affectionate barbs about the movie biz. While he hasn’t lost his mordant wit or sense of mischief, Beverly Hills John finds Waters in a more reflective mood, asking the question: ‘Since celebrity is the only obscenity left in the art world, where do I fit in?’ He also hopes to resolve issues about childhood fame, false glamour, the horrors of nouveau-riche excess, his ongoing sexual attractions and the possible risk of ‘careericide’ with dignity.

John Waters
Bad Director’s Chair
February 7–March 8, 2014
Berlin

One of the most celebrated directors in American independent cinema, John Waters is at his vibrant best when flaunting Hollywood’s rules or reveling in bad taste. The director of Pink Flamingos (1972) and Pecker (1998) brings the same wit and audacity to the art gallery. Perched upon his Bad Director’s Chair, Waters has cast his eye over some unlikely corners of the film business, transforming his observations of all the glamour and heartbreak of Hollywood into photographic essays and narrative sculptures that are both ridiculously honest and brutally humorous. Waters becomes the self-appointed press agent for his newly conceived “little movies” who would surely be fired the first day of a shoot by the furious producers.