Robin Rhode
Der Botanische Garten [The Botanical Garden]
In the past few weeks, artist Robin Rhode has realized his site-specific mural Der Botanische Garten [engl. The Botanical Garden] on the south façade of blu Sport- und Freizeitbad in Potsdam. The large-scale artwork, prominently visible from the terrace of DAS MINSK at the Brauhausberg, greatly enhances the view of the Potsdam cityscape.
Rhode’s Potsdam mural extends across the entire south façade of blu. Rendered in various shades of blue, abstracted floral shapes emerge, evoking both botanical illustrations and organic processes. The wall becomes a visual narrative of transformation, nature, and cultural rootedness. The artist draws inspiration from Goethe’s text The Metamorphosis of Plants (1750) for his mural. Goethe’s conception of the constant transformation in nature is reflected in Rhode’s dynamic visual language. Indigenous South African medicinal plants, such as Buchu (Agathosma betulina), Hoodia (Hoodia gordonii), Silene capensis (also known as Silene undulata), and Canna (Canna indica), feature in his work, serving as symbols of resilience, healing, and cultural exchange. In Potsdam—a city with rich botanical and scientific history—such a dialogue unfolds between South African heritage and a European context. Robin Rhode uses Prussian Blue—a deep, intense pigment discovered in Berlin in 1706, the first modern synthetic pigment in Europe. It replaced the costly ultramarine and was used extensively in art, architecture, and cartography, particularly in Prussian Potsdam residences like Sanssouci and the Neues Palais. The choice of this color connects the artwork to the city’s cultural history, recalling its historic significance. The blue tones also flow seamlessly into the silhouette of the Potsdam cityscape and dissolve gently into the sky above. The mural is complemented by figures that were developed on site during the production process, adding an immediate and site-specific dimension to the work. The figures evoke an association with fine porcelain, referencing Potsdam’s rich heritage of artisanal craftsmanship. Its interior features a visual motif inspired by the iconic beech trees of Sanssouci Park. Yet the figures appear remarkably dynamic as they playfully engage with the petals, as if parkouring through the garden — one poised above a window, seemingly mid-motion, about to perform a cartwheel.
The historic swimming hall at Brauhausberg was demolished in 2018. Originally part of an ensemble with the former terrace restaurant “Minsk”—both designed by architect Karl-Heinz Birkholz—it once offered an unobstructed view of the Potsdam cityscape from the Brauhausberg. With the construction of the blu Sport- und Freizeitbad, the visual axis to the city center was altered. Drawing inspiration from the historic panorama of Potsdam’s cityscape, Robin Rhode has now created a mural that redefines the view from the terrace of DAS MINSK—allowing it to fully unfold its impact from this vantage point.
The artwork was commissioned by the Hasso Plattner Foundation, and the project was realized in cooperation with DAS MINSK Kunsthaus in Potsdam, and Stadtwerke Potsdam. With their joint efforts, the unique view from DAS MINSK over the city of Potsdam is being recreated, offering Potsdam’s residents and visitors a new opportunity to engage with art and culture at the Brauhausberg.
"We are very pleased to have found an artistic solution for the south façade of blu. In doing so, we are able to further activate the outdoor space—an area we intend to emphasize more strongly in our upcoming program. The work creates a wonderful visual connection between DAS MINSK and the Potsdam city panorama.”
—Stefanie Plattner, Member of the Hasso Plattner Foundation Board
"Robin Rhode is an outstanding artist, and having his work in public space is a great asset—for DAS MINSK and for the city of Potsdam. Through his deep engagement with the history of the place, he builds a bridge to Indigenous South African medicinal plants, thus connecting a global perspective with a local context.”
—Anna Schneider, Director of DAS MINSK Kunsthaus in Potsdam
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Biography Robin Rhode
Robin Rhode, portrait, 2022. Photo: Tilman Volger
With his research-based and socially engaged practice, Robin Rhode (b. 1976, Cape Town, South Africa; lives and works in Berlin) engages the urban landscape to create complex, symbolically rich narratives that disrupt and transform their environments.
The artist is best known for his multi-panel works that deftly combine photography, performance, wall painting, and drawing. Negotiating the urban landscape, these photographs often depict silhouetted figures interacting with carefully composed wall paintings that the artist paints in public spaces, most often in the city of Johannesburg. In each succession of photographs, the choreographed movements of the individual or group appear to alter the two-dimensional renderings, compressing space and time and morphing the urban landscape into a fictional storyboard. Using the medium of photography to capture his painted and performative actions, Rhode disrupts the fixity of the wall, rendering it a mobile substrate that can be transported into a variety of contexts.
Rhode considers his wall-based works to be visual interventions in their cultural, political, and ecological environments, and he aims to transform both landscapes and communities. The artist works collaboratively with a team of over a dozen community members, most from formerly segregated neighborhoods in postapartheid Johannesburg. Working in urban space and engaging his local communities, Rhode situates his practice within and for the public sphere, and he probes the myriad ways that politics manifests itself in and as everyday life.
The wall is at the center of Rhode’s practice, and he considers its many meanings and functions: as a divider within urban space, as a surface and substrate in art historical traditions ranging from cave painting to street art, as a threshold between art and life in notion of the “fourth wall,” and as a psychoanalytic screen. In Rhode’s works, these varied associations converge to mutually complicate each other, creating a hybrid narrative mode that reflects the nuances of urban, post-apartheid diasporic experience.
