© Photo: Dogs bite back (c)
Luisa Ziaja
Oliver Ressler’s artistic and activist practice is based on the conviction that social conditions are not given but rather can be changed. For around three decades, Ressler has been focusing on urgent aspects of democracy, the economy, migration, and ecology, highlighting structural causes as well as forms of resistance and possible courses of action. Making social alternatives conceivable is a central motif in his work.
The exhibition Dog Days Bite Back brings together films and photographic works from recent years that address various dimensions of the climate crisis in all its economic, political, and social complexity and intertwine them with international climate justice movements. Ressler thus emphasizes that the effects of climate collapse that can now be felt across the world are linked to systemic failures in climate policy and a long overdue paradigm shift in global economic systems.
Taking a firm stance as an observer, he documents acts of civil disobedience, portrays the different ways in which climate activists organize and mobilize themselves, and reflects on his role as an involved participant and artistic researcher. The title Dog Days Bite Back is borrowed from a photomontage by Ressler and refers to a statement by UN Secretary-General António Guterres about the summer of 2023 being the hottest on record: “The dog days of summer are not just barking, they are biting.” Oliver Ressler’s works are combative and bitingly relevant.
