“Let’s Get Married, Let’s Get Lost” Exhibition by Walter Dahn, Co-Founder of the Legendary Mülheimer Freiheit Group, at Sprüth Magers Gallery

Let’s recall a man who stood in front of the canvas with the question “Why am I painting anyway?”, embodying the rebellious, rule-breaking punk spirit of 1980s Cologne: Walter Dahn. A student of Joseph Beuys and one of the founders of the “Bad Painting” movement and the legendary Mülheimer Freiheit group, Dahn’s body of work takes center stage in the exhibition “Let’s Get Married, Let’s Get Lost,” opening its doors between September 11 and October 24, 2026, at Sprüth Magers gallery in Berlin.

When you look at Walter Dahn’s early works from the beginning of the 1980s, the first thing you feel is a rushed, almost spilled-out rawness. Acrylic paints dripping down the canvas, skulls that look as if drawn on the spur of the moment, peace symbols, hats winking at his master Beuys, and grotesque body parts… This is an open rebellion against the market’s expectation of “pretty painting” and art turning into commercial decoration. That messy line mixed with humor shows the artist’s most honest stance as he questions the function of the canvas.

His gradual transition away from painting toward silk screen printing in the following years is also quite interesting. In these works, which he produced as unique single copies rather than mass-producing them, he integrates the music world he is so passionate about. Icons from The Smiths, Sex Pistols, or The National album covers, Oscar Wilde aphorisms, and ethnographic photographs meet on the same surface. Passing the visual codes of daily life and popular culture through his own lens, Dahn maps out a personal memory chart.

If you’re around Berlin in the autumn, it’s well worth adding this exhibition to your itinerary. Seeing one of the simplest expressions of music, punk street culture, and wrestling with the canvas feels genuinely refreshing in art’s sometimes overly gloomy world.