Mari Lena Rapprich
Mari Lena Rapprich is an artist, curator, and researcher, currently working between Bremen and Tunis. In her artistic work, Mari Lena moves between systematic drawing, overlapping lines, and experimental soundscapes. The starting point is often writing and ordering systems, to which the hand must submit. Existing systems serve as instructions for drawing and/or auditory processes, in which repetition, rhythmic movements, failure as a productive moment, and temporality are embedded. In 2020, Mari Lena published the artist’s book «Repeat» along with the accompanying tape «24:06». Currently, Mari Lena is conducting both artistic and academic research on the analogy between drawing and weaving as well as on sound in film.
Residency 16. - 26.10.2025
«recap + listen»
«recap + listen» initiated by Mari Lena Rapprich, is an ongoing artistic-scientific strategy rather than a one-time project. «recap + listen» functions as a space for negotiation, where different perspectives intersect, allowing for productive exchange and critical reflection. It explores how we listen, what we hear, and whose voices are being heard, especially within contexts shaped by power dynamics, colonization, class, and discrimination. «recap + listen» questions established structures of artistic and academic canons and aims to highlight marginalized or often overlooked narratives through dialogical and collaborative practice.
The project engages with personal, institutional, and ideological boundaries, inviting participants to reflect on and expand these limits, and to be shaped by the experiences of others. In doing so, «recap + listen» seeks to create shared spaces for dialogue that embrace complexity and foster coexistence. «recap» means capturing the status quo and contextualizing it in order to make complex relationships and stories visible, while «listen» emphasizes empathetic and active listening as a foundation for understanding, community, and a reconsideration of the question of who is allowed to speak and be heard. Listening becomes a tool of solidarity, recognition, and transformation.
Mari Lena’s artistic approach is interdisciplinary and research-based. She uses methods such as lectures, reading sessions, conversations, workshops, and both artistic and research-based residencies to create spaces for encounter and reflection, and to connect theory with practice. Mari Lena works with textual, visual, and discursive media, aiming to involve participants in personal, environmental, and dialogical processes. In this context, both «recap + listen» and Mari Lena’s practice are grounded in collaborative knowledge production, fostering a growing corpus of materials that responds to context, participation, and critical exchange. «recap + listen» is understood as an open collection or evolving archive, where artistic practice, research, and dialogical engagement interact and enter into relation and reflection as individual artifacts or objects. Each artifact connects different perspectives, lived experiences, and narratives.
As part of «Re Capitulating» at Thealit Arbeitszimmer, Mari Lena will continue her artistic-scientific research, focusing on text-based work and literature research, while organizing, classifying, and transforming existing artifacts. This follows a previous research residency in Tunis, Tunisia, earlier this year, during which Mari Lena specifically engaged with texts and photographs from the MENA region. The 10-day residency at Thealit includes a program of talks, a lecture, an Open Studio day and reading sessions.
FRIDAY October 17th, 7 pm
Language: German
Lesung: Wo ich (nicht) sein sollte
Where I (shouldn't) be - A book about shame and classism by/with Sara Mari Blom
followed by a discussion moderated by Mari Lena Rapprich
Education, love, home, faith, money – all of these are places where Sara Mari Blom feels ashamed. For years, she collected places like these until she realized: Almost all of her shameful places have to do with her origins – and with the fact that she has seemingly left them behind. "Where I (shouldn't) be" examines the emotional consequences of so-called educational advancement. The author contrasts this much-touted success story with her experiences of classism and inner turmoil. And she introduces a relentless protagonist that shapes her life: shame.
As a working-class child from a rural area, Sara Mari Blom (*1994) studied costume design in Hanover and integrated design in Bremen. She is an alumna of the 2020/21 Tasawar Curatorial Studios at the Goethe-Institut Tunis and received the IFA scholarship from the 2021 Cross Culture Program. As an artist, writer, and working-class woman, she explores the relationship between class, space, and encounter. She particularly explores the in-between space that arises when social classes are transcended—and the shame associated with it.
More about Sara Mari Blom: saramariblom.com
https://www.instagram.com/saramariblom
SATURDAY, October 18,
12 –4 pm
Language: German + English
Reading Session #1:
Class, Visibility, Movement / Klasse, Sichtbarkeit, Bewegung
Together, we will explore personal, institutional, and ideological boundaries and relate them to the topic of "Class, Visibility, Movement." The selection of texts and passages is based on Mari Lena Rapprich's ongoing research and incorporates different approaches to thinking and acting. Please register at: info(at)marilenarapprich.de
FRIDAY October, 24, Start: 7 pm
Open Studio: «recap + listen»
At the conclusion of the 10-day residency in the Thealit studio for Re.Capitualting, Mari Lena Rapprich will present her current artistic and scientific research approach – «recap + listen» is conceived as an open collection or a growing archive in which artistic practice, research, and dialogic discussions interact and enter into relation and reflection with one another as individual artifacts or objects. Each artifact connects different perspectives, realities, and stories.
SATURDAY, October, 25
2–4 pm
Language: German + English
Reading Session #2:
Thinking, Feeling, Resistance / Denken, Fühlen, Widerstand
Together, we will explore personal, institutional, and ideological boundaries and relate them to the topic of "Thinking, Feeling, Resistance." The selection of texts and passages is based on Mari Lena Rapprich's ongoing research and incorporates different approaches to thinking and acting. Please register at: info(at)marilenarapprich.de