WANDERLUST
Annual Exhibition by Dietmar Brixy at the Alte Pumpwerk Mannheim
September 26 – October 19, 2025
With guest artist Johannes Hepp (Sculpture) | Presented by Galerie Tammen, Berlin
The Gates Open Again
As every autumn, the historic Alte Pumpwerk in Mannheim-Neckarau once again opens its doors. In 2025, Dietmar Brixy continues his tradition of hosting an annual solo exhibition in this extraordinary location – this time exploring a theme that resonates deeply with our times: WANDERLUST.
This word – evoking the urge to travel, a spirit of discovery, and an inner longing – serves not only as the exhibition title, but also as the conceptual thread running through Brixy’s newest body of work. It also creates a thematic framework for this year’s guest artist: sculptor Johannes Hepp, whose wooden figures set distinct artistic accents within the shared space.
Wanderlust, 2025, oil on canvas, 24 x 18 cm
WANDERLUST – A Painterly Expedition
With his new series WANDERLUST, Dietmar Brixy invites viewers on a sensory and painterly expedition. This is not merely an exhibition of individual works – it is an immersive journey into imagined landscapes, rooted in both the natural world and the artist’s inner vision.
Brixy’s painting becomes a medium of movement and transformation. Rather than depicting reality, these works embody shifting spaces, emotional states, and transitional phases. Energetic structures collide, blend, dissolve, and reform within his complex compositions. His canvases hover between abstraction and the suggestion of landscape – evoking forests, horizons, and light atmospheres – while always leaving space for personal interpretation.
At the core lies Wanderlust as a state of longing: for direction, freedom, and self-discovery. This theme manifests visually as paths and traces – like maps guiding us through unknown terrain.
One of the most striking elements of the exhibition is the group “Wanderlust Bubble”. These circular paintings recall portholes, telescopes, or planetary windows – drawing the viewer into an alternate dimension. The round format invites a sense of balance and introspection amid visual dynamism.
The color palette remains vivid and bold: luminous orange, deep violet, turquoise, magenta, midnight blue, and fresh greens emerge in layered textures. Every brushstroke speaks of rhythm, motion, energy – never static, always evolving. The surfaces appear almost sculptural – full of marks, fractures, density – forming a visual echo chamber for memory and emotion.
This is painting without linear narrative. The works function more like emotional landscapes – with detours, voids, layers, and condensed zones. They unfold anew with each viewing, revealing materiality and atmosphere in unexpected ways.
The act of painting itself becomes a journey of seeking and finding. Brixy’s brush explores, overlaps, erases, reveals – a process of inner wandering that merges artistic expression with emotional intuition.
Wanderlust Bubble, 2025, oil on canvas, D 50 cm
“Wanderlust in Wood” – Johannes Hepp at the Alte Pumpwerk
This year, Galerie Tammen from Berlin presents guest artist Johannes Hepp with a selection of expressive wooden sculptures. His finely carved figures form a compelling contrast to Brixy’s expansive paintings: where Brixy opens vast spaces in color, Hepp focuses on the intimate, the quiet, and the introspective.
Hepp’s sculptures are storytellers. These sensitive, often subtly exaggerated figures are never caricatures – rather, they convey nuanced emotional states through posture, gesture, and expression. Themes such as closeness and distance, vulnerability and strength, wonder and resignation all exist simultaneously within their forms.
Some of his works incorporate everyday objects or contain moveable parts that provoke surprise – poetic, humorous, and always crafted with exceptional skill. His sculptures echo the exhibition theme Wanderlust as well – not as physical travel, but as an inner journey, a state of in-between, a search for grounding or direction.
“Between Two Ends”, painted limewood, 2018
Exhibition Details
📍 Venue: Alte Pumpwerk Neckarau
Aufeldstraße 19, 68199 Mannheim
📅 Dates: September 26 – October 19, 2025
🕒 Opening Hours:
Fridays: 2 PM – 7 PM
Saturdays & Sundays: 11 AM – 4 PM
Visitor Information
🚧 Please note: Roadwork is planned in the area around the Alte Pumpwerk and may affect access to the exhibition.
Possible construction work – please follow any posted detour signage.
🅿️ Parking is available at the adjacent administration building of GKM Mannheim. Marguerrestraße 1, 68199 Mannheim
