Beate Passow: Monkey Business

In her series of images Monkey Business, the artist Beate Passow portrays a mysterious fairy-tale world of political dimensions. The black and white images, which upon closer observation turn out to be sophisticated tapestries, question the ruling systems, economic structures, and political movements of contemporary Europe.

A Barbary macaque sits on a martial gun barrel in Gibraltar, a powerful bear mounts a bull, a skeleton-like figure strides over destroyed refugee boats on Lampedusa. The strange figures that inhabit Monkey Business narrate a penetrating mythology of the 21st century. In her narrative approach, Passow subverts the established tapestry tradition, not praising rulers and heroes, but directing criticism at today's Europe. Once celebrated as the stronghold of democracy and humanism, it is today marked by a military defensive stance at its borders, by a thoroughly corrupt capitalism, and by increasingly brazen Neo-Nazi movements.