The exhibition The Most Contemporary Picture Show, Actually investigates painting's contemporary potentials by taking up specific discourse from the 1980s, so pinpointing the historical conditions of each medium and the associated ideological approaches. The artistic concepts of René Daniels (*1950), Michael Krebber (*1954) and Klaus Merkel (*1953) demand spaces for reflection and criticism alongside and in the paintings; although the three artists (with some reservation in Krebber's case) are known as painters, they also work in a field above and beyond genuine painterly problems, examining questions that concern the mediation contexts of art, the role of the artist, the conception and reception of pictures, or even the very effectiveness of media.

The curator Hans-Jürgen Hafner compares selected early and current works by these artists in an exhibition that presents a field of investigation centring on key concepts of interpretation such as aesthetics and concept, painting and ideology, object and context, display and perception. The formal diversity and thematic emphasis of this exhibition are intended as a stimulus to further discussion.

Parallel to the exhibition, the Verlag für moderne Kunst Nürnberg will be presenting a publication (Germ./Engl.) with texts by Markus Brüderlin and Hans-Jürgen Hafner, edited by Ellen Seifermann.